


Déjà vu

by DKGwrites



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: AgentCorp, Angst with a Happy Ending, Children, F/F, Fate & Destiny, Karma - Freeform, not a Sanvers piece but they're kind of in here, this thing is kind of trippy folks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-07-20 16:12:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 39,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16140830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DKGwrites/pseuds/DKGwrites
Summary: When a Luthor Corp mech is loose in National City, Maggie and others injured and pinned down, Alex goes to Lena, the only person possibly capable of disarming the mech, for help.  Lena gets in over her head with a voice from her past and gets confronted with what her choices could mean for her future.





	1. A Life Hangs in Imbalance

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this last year for a friend, and it's never been posted. I'm trying to clear some things out, so I thought I'd just post it. The editing (or lack thereof) and the writing may be rough. I'm not posting anything new until I finish my WIPs, but I figured an old piece would be fine.

Lena sat in her office typing up an email to the board about an upcoming project.  She leaned back in her chair, her white linen suit, the red satin lining on the jacket showing where it fell open over the white camisole on one side by design.  This project was groundbreaking, but losing control of it to the board could be a tactical disaster.  Lena needed to create some anticipation without raising too many expectations to have them push for early results.  In her role of CEO of L-Corp, it had all become a balancing act.  As she searched for the perfect point to pick between puckering and actually kissing ass, a commotion from outside her office door caught her attention and then Jess’ voice became clearer.

“You don’t have an appointment,” Jess said.  “You can’t go in there!”

The door nearly burst open.  “I need you to come with me right now!”

Slowly, Lena rose to her feet, her mind needing a moment to register the person standing before her.  “Agent Danvers?”

“Now, Luthor, now!” In black tactical gear, at least four weapons strapped to her body, and her every muscle tensed, Alex Danvers strode across the office and grabbed Lena’s wrist.  “Let’s go!”

Grabbing her one hand with her other one, Lena pulled back suddenly and broke the agent’s grip…possibly to both of their surprises.  “Are you out of your mind?  This suit is linen.  You wrinkled the sleeve.  I have two more business meetings today.”

“No, you don’t.  Your meetings are canceled.  You’re coming with me.  It’s a matter of life and death.”

Lena tensed.  “Wait, is this about that weapon cache of Lex’s my mother had found?  Is she…Is my mother on her way for me?”

“Yes and no,” Alex replied, grabbing Lena by the wrist again.  “We found the weapon cache.  Your mother doesn’t have it again.”

“Then why…?  Let go of me!  Honest to God, Agent Danvers, you are going to get yourself drown in lawsuits if you don’t stop right…Wait.  Is this about Kara?  Is Kara all right?”

“I…” Eyes closed, Alex took in a deep breath and let it out slowly.  “Jesus, Luthor, I can’t go into this right now.  Look, Kara is…Kara is not the problem.  It’s Maggie.”

Eyes narrowed, Lena asked, “The officer who arrested me?”

“Right, right, yeah.  Look, some cops were following a tip about some alien tech.  It was Maggie and a few others.  She got down there, saw what the tech was, and realized it was out of their league.  She was just calling me, telling me they needed backup when there was screaming and cursing, and then the line went dead.  So I—”

“Let go of my arm.”

“Will you just let me—”

“Let go of my arm,” Lena demanded with a bit more force.

“Fine!” With a tossing motion, Alex pushed Lena’s arm back toward the CEO.  “Look, when we got there, we found this!”

Alex pulled out her cellphone.  She opened it bringing up a video.  At first, all one could clearly make out was the line of black vehicles that obviously were owned by some federal division or another and the agents, all dressed like Alex, huddled behind them.  Then, as the camera view was raised and zoomed in, the image changed.  Drones zoomed through the air and not the little ones children used as toys.  These were easily the size of a kitchen table.  They seemed to be creating some kind of perimeter around a warehouse of sorts.  Then, lumbering into view, it came.  It was a mech, and although it was a bit hard to judge size given the perspective, it looked to stand somewhere between twelve and fifteen feet tall if not taller.  Where it wasn’t a silvery-gray, it was green and purple.  In place of a hand on one side, it had a machine gun.  On the other side, it had two large cylinders that looked to fire shells.  It had no head, instead just an area on top where cubes that fired missiles sat.  It walked on feet with three toes, two in front splayed out and one in the back, but on the top of each foot sat a tread making it look as if it could switch to a different mode of movement.  In the middle of its torso were a big black L with slightly smaller purple C within it.

Pointing at the screen, Lena said, “That symbol, is that…?”

“Luthor Corp,” Alex confirmed.  “Like I said, we found your brother’s weapon cache.  I need you to come with me now.”

Nodding, Lena grabbed her cellphone, shoving it into her jacket pocket.  “Is that thing headed this way?”

Walking toward the doorway, Alex replied, “No.  I need you to come with me to the warehouse where that thing is.  My agents can’t get near it.  I called my best tech who’s out of the country, and he suggested I get you and…” Alex looked around, realizing she was alone at the doorway. 

Turning back showed Lena standing by the desk, arms crossed.  The CEO leaned back almost sitting on the horizontal surface as she crossed her legs.  She smoothed her pencil skirt before recrossing her legs, one of her four-inch heels tapping out her irritation.  One eyebrow raised, Lena’s face was impassive as she remained immobile.

Stomping back into the office, Alex said, “What the fuck is it now!?”

“Oh, I’m not going to that thing.  My mother only raised one maniac, and he’s serving thirty-seven consecutive life sentences.  If it’s down there, I’ll be staying here, thank you.”

“What part of agents pinned down and cops in trouble didn’t you understand, Luthor!?”

“So, call Supergirl,” Lena said with a shrug. “Surely the Girl of Steel—”

“She went!  It took her down!”

There were several moments of stunned silence between them.

Quietly, Lena clarified, “It…hurt Supergirl?”

“The mech is armed with Kryptonite.  Supergirl’s…hurt.” Agent Danvers looked down and away, her voice breaking on the final word as she pulled in a deep, steady breath.

“Will she be—?”

“Yes, she’ll be fine.  She’ll be fine,” Alex said, though it sounded like she was speaking to both of them.  She nodded meeting the CEO’s eyes then, waiting for Lena to nod back before continuing.  “Look, my boss is… He’s…out of the country too.  I’m in charge, and I don’t have any backup that can help with this thing right now.  We’ve got someone over at the prison trying to get some answers from your brother, but that isn’t going well.  My tech said to get you because the thing is Luthor Corp tech, so I’m coming for you.  I need your help.  Those cops locked in the warehouse need your help.  Come with me.”

Lena shrugged.  “I don’t know anything about Luthor Corp tech.”  When Alex opened her mouth, Lena spoke hurriedly.  “Really, Agent Danvers, I had nothing to do with my family’s business before Lex was arrested and I moved it to National City.  I was working out of a garage, trying to cure cancer, while Lex was building weapons of mass destruction and trying to murder aliens.  The closest I’ve ever been to his technology is when it was trying to kill me.  I’m not eager for a repeat performance.”

“You have to at least try.” Alex’s voice pleaded and she ran a hand through her hair.  Holding that hand out to the CEO she said, “Please, people’s lives are at stake.  Maggie’s life is at stake.  You have to at least try.”

Lena opened her mouth, but instead of replying immediately, she nodded at first.  “Of course.  Of course, I do.  I don’t know how I can help, but I’ll try.  I’ll try.”

Eyes closed, Alex sighed heavily.  It looked like a great weight had shifted, not lifted, but shifted on her shoulders, and she whispered, “Thank you.”  When she opened her eyes moments later, the strength and determination had returned, that moment of…not weakness, that moment of vulnerability she had allowed to be seen was hidden away again and the shell of the agent was fully back in place.  Turning on her heel again, Alex headed to the door, talking as she walked.  “We don’t have much time.  The Kryptonite bomb your head-case of a brother built in there is set to go off in…and, you’re not with me anymore, are you?”  At the door again, Alex turned to prove she was right, Lena was stopped halfway in the room.  “What the hell is it now?!  Bomb, was it the word bomb?!”

“It was the word bomb.”

Hands covering her face, Alex took several breaths before dropping them and nearly shouting at the CEO, “Have you not been listening to me?  People are going to die!”

“People near the bomb.”

“Well yes, but—”

“And you want me to go near the bomb,” Lena further clarified.

Hands in fists that she tightened and loosened, Alex gritted out between her teeth, “Yes.”

“So, you see why I might be hesitant.  Am I currently in the bomb’s blast radius?”

“Well no, but—”

With a quick nod, Lena turned back to her desk.  “I see.  Well, that decision’s made.  I decline.  I’d suggest you begin evacuation procedures.  I, however, shall decline to go within the blast radius.”

“God damn it, lady!  I don’t have time for this crap!” With a growl, Alex walked up behind Lena, grabbing the CEO by the wrist and spinning her around.  She bent over, not letting go of Lena’s wrist, and looping her arm between the CEO’s legs, partially hiking up the woman’s skirt in the process.  She took the arm that was between Lena’s legs and used that hand to grab Lena’s front wrist as she stood, the CEO over her shoulders in a fireman’s carry.

“What the…!?  Put me down!”  Lena shrieked as she struggled, kicking as best she could with one leg, though it wasn't very much, and pounding on Agent Danvers’ back to only be met with unyielding Kevlar.

Turning again, Alex strode toward the door, giving a little hiking motion to tuck Lena more snuggly in place, the air whooshing out of the CEO at the sudden movement.  “Lady, when I was a little kid, my parents were big into choice.  At bedtime, they used to tell me I had to go upstairs to bed, but I had two choices: walk or get carried.  I gave you the walking choice, and you declined, so this is how we’re doing things.”  As they neared the doorway, Alex twisted so Lena would go out headfirst, spinning at the last moment and catching the woman’s heel on the doorframe, cracking the stiletto.

“Did you just…!?  Son of a bitch!  That was a Lois Vuitton!  Do you know how much these shoes cost me!?”

“Don’t know.  Don’t care,” Alex replied as she strode past Lena’s secretary’s desk.

“Miss Luthor!”  Jess grabbed the phone from the desk.  “Who do you want me to call?  “Should I call—?”

“Call security!  Call my lawyers!  Call the police!  Call the President of the United States if you can; just call someone!”

Alex stopped by the elevator, pushing the down button, then grabbed her cellphone from her pocket.  “Facetime Olivia Marsdin.”

The phone rang several times before it was answered, the face of President Marsdin coming into view.  “Agent Danvers, do you have a status update for me on the…?” The President twisted her head to the side and leaned in slightly.  “Is that Lena Luthor?”

“Yes, Madam President,” Alex replied.

“Is she…upside down?”

Alex looked to her right where the rather red and definitely furious face of Lena Luthor stared back at her, tight-lipped, before returning to look at her phone again.  “Um, somewhat, yes, Madam President.”

“Agent Danvers, this better be good.  Update me.”

“Of course, Madam President.”  Readjusting the weight on her back again, and trying to not grimace at the grunt it caused her passenger, Alex said, “The mech and drones are all armed with Kryptonite.  Supergirl is down.  We have medical staff on site and are removing the projectiles from her there.  We have just over an hour and a half until the bomb detonates.  Even if we could reach J’onn, he and Superman are in a location where they couldn’t make it back in time.  Negotiations at the prison are going nowhere.  Our best tech suggested I get Miss Luthor.”

“So you kidnapped her?” The President asked.

Alex opened her mouth to respond, but Lena said, “Thank you Madam—” She grunted again, the air whooshing out when she was suddenly readjusted again.

The elevator opened, and Alex stepped inside, ignoring the yell of the secretary as they disappeared within.  Alex pressed the button for the lobby, pointing at one of the weapons on her side when Jess rushed her.  It was enough to stop the woman’s advance so that the doors closed and the elevator lurched into motion.

“Madam President,” Alex began, looking at her phone again.  “We don’t know exactly how big the explosion will be, but we’re estimating the loss of life to be in the thousands.  There are two hospitals in the blast radius from what our agents have been able to get out of Lex.  People are going to die.  A lot of people are going to die.  Some will die even if we move them.  What choice do we have here?”

The President nodded.  “How long will it take you to get Miss Luthor out of the blast radius?”

“I have a helicopter on the way to a field that’s a five-minute drive from there.  She drives out of there, and she’s clear of the place within eight minutes tops.”

“Fine,” the President said.

“Fine!?” Lena yelled.

“She leaves twenty minutes prior to detonation,” Olivia Marsdin clarified.

“But, Madam President, if we had—”

“This is not a negotiation, Agent Danvers.  This is an order.  Do try and take this one better than the last one.  Your badge would fit just as well in someone else’s pocket.  Your family has earned only so much goodwill with us.  Understood?”

“Understood, ma’am.”

“Miss Luthor,” the President’s gaze locked with Lena’s.  “The people of National City thank you for your service.  You’re a true patriot.”

“I…I’m being kidnapped,” Lena protested.

“Patriotically,” the President replied with a wink.  Her hand obscured the screen before it went black.

Lena was quiet for several moments while Alex slid the phone back into a pocket.  Finally, she muttered, “I can’t believe I voted for that woman.”

“Well, you can change that come her re-election.”  Alex shifted Lena again, though this time a bit more tenderly.  “I can’t believe you voted Democrat.”

“Every year since I’ve been old enough to vote.  It’s really pissed off my mother.”

A slight chuckle escaped the agent.  Reaching up with her free hand, she patted Lena’s leg.  “Good for you kid.  I guess Kara’s right about you.”

“Agent Danvers.” Lena inhaled, letting out a cleansing breath.  “That’s my ass.”

“Oh, uh…Well, it’s really—”

“Move your hand…away!”

“Sorry,” Alex said sheepishly.  “So this elevator is kind of slow.  Why is it so slow?”

“Security.”

“What?”

“When you kidnap the CEO, they slow down the elevator she’s in while they ready security on the ground floor.  It’s so they can shoot you, Agent Danvers.  They also watch while you cop a feel.” Lena pointed awkwardly above and behind her at the silver half-circle on the ceiling.

Alex nodded, pulling out her ID and holding it up to the camera in the ceiling.  “My name is Agent Alex Danvers of the FBI.  By order of the President of the United States, Miss Luthor is assisting us with an incident downtown and will be coming with me.”

Lena snorted.  “Sure, that will work.”

“You heard the president.”  Not receiving agreement, Alex repeated, “You heard her.  Miss Luthor?”

“Yes, yes, I heard her.  I’m a fucking patriot.” 

Alex nodded.  “Make sure your security knows it too.” 

“You can put me down now.”

“Oh, that is not going to happen.”

“Where am I going to go?” Lena asked.  “Seriously, we’re in a fucking elevator.  We’re in an seven-foot by seven-foot room.  What am I going to do, escape through the ceiling?”

“I could,” Alex replied attempting to shrug, only managing to disrupt her passenger and needing to hoist her back into place.

“Feel free.  No one’s stopping you.  Much like airplanes, I prefer riding inside elevators.”

The silence stretched between them, Alex tapping her toe.  “You know, for elevator music, this isn’t—”

“Stop talking.  We’re not talking.  I’m not talking to you.”

“Whatever.”

Finally, they reached the ground floor.  As the doors opened, Alex spun, so her back with Lena on it was toward the opening door.  She held her badge up over her shoulder.  “Agent Alex Danvers, FBI.  By order of the President of the United States, I am authorized to take Miss Lena Luthor with me.  Please stand aside.”

“Re…really!?  Are you really using me as a shield!?” Lena tried to shift around, spinning her head enough that she could look at her security squad, guns drawn and pointed at her location.  “Well, don’t shoot!”

“Miss Luthor, please tell your men to stand down,” Alex asked.

With a sigh of disgust, Lena said, “Stand down.  Move aside and let us go.”

The security officers hesitated, and one of them spoke.  “Miss Luthor, we’re not authorized to allow your—”

“Oh, it’s not a kidnapping,” Lena assured them.  “She really is a federal agent, and the President…and I will vote Green Party before I vote for her again, the President really did authorize this train wreck.  Stand down, code: Oganesson, Boron, Mercury.”

“Just a moment, Miss Luthor.” The officer spoke quietly for a moment, hand at his ear when he nodded his response.  “Code authorized.  Everyone, stand down!  Status is returned to green!  I repeat, code authorized, stand down!”

As people moved aside, Alex turned and stepped through the door.  There was a cracking sound and she froze, turning to stare into Lena’s eyes.

“Did you just break my other…?”

With an eye roll, Alex said, “Sorry.  Well, at least now you have a matching pair.”  Security still followed while the duo made their way to the door.  When they reached it, Alex said, “Would someone mind getting that for me?  The automatic doors don’t seem to be working.  Another security protocol?”

“Hmmm.”

One of the security officers pulled out a badge, swiping it and turning a light green before he pushed a door open and stepped outside ahead of them, holding the door open.

Alex’s car sat just feet away on the sidewalk, directly in front of the door.  The light inside marking it as some kind of police vehicle was already flashing.  In the street members of the NCPD had already arrived.  Two police cars sat in the street, lights flashing, and officers were in place with guns drawn as they leaned over the hoods of their vehicles and peered around open doors.

“This is the NCPD.  Do not…Agent Danvers?”

“Oh, hey Toni.” Alex waved, badge still in her hand.  “This is official FBI business.  We’re good here.”

The cop stood, lowering her gun and tilting her head.  “Uh, Agent Danvers, we received a call from L-Corp that Miss Luthor was being kidnapped and you’re…well, you’re…Agent Danvers?”

“It’s not a kidnapping.”  Slipping her badge in her pocket, Alex pulled out her keys and pushed the button on the fob, making it beep twice and unlocking the door.  She shoved the keys back in her pocket.  “Miss Luthor broke her heels, so I’m carrying her to the car.  She has a meeting to get to, right Miss Luthor?”  Alex reached up, patting Lena again.

“Still my ass!”

“Sorry,” Alex said, withdrawing her hand quickly as she opened the car door.  “Miss Luthor, would you please confirm for the NCPD that you’re coming with me voluntarily?”

“Voluntarily?”  Lips pressed together, Lena’s jaw moved back and forth though she didn’t make a sound.

As the police tensed, weapons, trained on her, Alex turned to meet Lena’s glare. “Miss Luthor…please.  There are two hospitals in the zone.  We won’t get everyone out.”  She felt the change in Lena’s body, saw the younger woman’s face shift to a defeated concern.

Lena nodded.  “Fine.  It’s fine!  I’m going with Agent Danvers’ voluntarily!  Please let us go.”

“Thank you.” It wasn’t much more than a whisper as Alex turned and knelt, her free hand on Lena’s head, making sure it didn’t collide with the car.  She placed the other woman in the vehicle, closing the door and hurrying around into the driver’s side.  As she started it, Alex put on her seatbelt and said, “Buckle up.”

“How are you going to get into the street?  I don’t see any…Jesus Christ!”  As the car lurched forward, careening down the sidewalk, Lena fumbled with her seatbelt locking it in place.  “Are you insane!?  What am I saying?  Clearly, you’re insane.  You just kidnapped me from my office, and now you’re driving down the sidewalk toward an explosive device guarded by some giant robot my brother created.  You know, your sister is a lovely, normal woman, but you, Agent Danvers, are a maniac.”

Alex gave Lena several quick, sideways glances out of the corner of her eye.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Alex replied with a headshake.  Suddenly she made a sharp left, turning the car between two open parking spots and skipping it off the sidewalk and back into the road, narrowly missing the parked vehicles and setting off blaring horns from the vehicles around her.

“Oh dear Lord in heaven.” Lena wrapped an arm around her seatbelt, grabbing the ‘oh shit’ handle over the door with her other hand.  “Well, at this rate, neither the bomb nor robot will kill me because your driving will do it.  I suppose that’s something.”

“Heh.  At least you’re an optimist.”  Seeing the line of vehicles up ahead of her, Alex hit her siren and pulled left to the open lane.

“Yellow line, Agent Danvers, yellow line!  Do you know what the yellow line means?”

Alex shrugged.  “Oh, don’t be so American.”  As she neared the intersection, she gave a quick glance in either direction and floored it.

“Do you know what a red light means!!!?”

As they cleared the intersection amid more blasts of horns, Alex replied, “Go very, very fast?”

“Son of a bitch,” Lena grumbled. “You ruined my outfit.  My skirt is in a shambles.  You broke both my heels.  Four inch Lois Vuitton stilettos trashed.  My jacket, my beautiful Akris linen jacket, totally ruined.”

“Ugh, stop bitching about your clothes, already.  I’ll buy you a new jacket, okay?”

Smirking, Lena asked, “This jacket, you’ll buy me another one of these jackets, Agent Danvers?”

“Yeah, sure, fine, whatever.  Just send me the bill, okay?  I’ll replace it so long as you stop bitching.”

With a chuckle, Lena said, “Oh, that will be fine.  This jacket cost $3,600.00.  To where should I send the bill, your home or the FBI?”

Head turning sharply to the right, the car veered, and Alex had to snap back into her lane as she looked where she was going again.  “You’re God damn suit cost over three grand!?  Are you fucking kidding me!?”

“My suit?” With a dry laugh, Lena replied, “Oh no, I was talking about just the jacket.  It’s an Akris designed by Albert Kriemler.  Would you care to know how much the skirt cost?  How about the shoes you so carelessly broke in your manhandling of me.  As I said, they’re Lois Vuitton.  For the record, they cost more than the jacket.”

Licking her lips to try to get some moisture back to her mouth, Alex replied, “It’s not manhandling.  I’m a woman.”

Eyes toward the ceiling, Lena shook her head.  “Well, forgive me for accusing you of being sexist while you were kidnapping me.”

Alex took the next right much too sharply, making it clear she was part of the TWA, ‘Two Wheel Association’.  The CEO just held on for dear life, muttering a combination of prayers and curses almost under her breath.  Very quickly they were on the highway heading north-west.  This time of day traffic was light which meant Alex was able to go above 100 miles per hour.

“I hate flying,” Lena said.

“Well, then be glad we’re driving.”

“Not at the speed we’re going.”

Alex grunted.  “Do you ever do anything but bitch, lady?”

“When I’ve been forcibly removed from my place of business and am being dragged into a bomb's radius to help someone save their…save their...their...”

“Girlfriend.”

Lena shrugged, “All right.  I wasn’t certain what term would be appropriate.  Kara told me about the proposal, about how that went.  I wasn't sure what you two were since...”

“Just because she said no doesn't mean we broke up.  She's still my girlfriend.  We just need more time.”

“Right.  Of course.”  Lena nodded.  “So, is your girlfriend still considering that job in Gotham?”

Alex glared.  “What the hell are you and Kara talking about?”

“Things.  She tells me what’s on her mind.  We’re friends.  We talk about things.”

Alex grumbled.  “I’ll talk to Kara.  I’m not things.  Hold on.  We’re coming up on our exit.”  Grabbing her radio, Alex said, “This is Agent Danvers.  I have Lena Luthor, and I’m coming in fast.  Clear the way.”

 A detour marked the exit up ahead, but it was open, and they were waved through.  The car skipped and bounced as they took it at harrowing speeds that had marked the entire ride.  They moved along several more side streets, but no other moving vehicles were in the way this time.  It was obvious the way had already been evacuated as best it could.  Though this time of day wasn’t rush hour, there was always a steady flow of traffic in these parts.  They turned left on the road and passed another group of agents that waved them through a fence into an industrial area.  Warehouses speckled the complex, and they continued straight for about half a minute before flashing lights noted the vehicles making a wide circle around one warehouse in particular.  They were clones of the one Alex was driving, a few SUVs of the same monochromatic government make, and two ambulances.  However, that was not what drew Lena’s attention.

Much like she’d seen on the video Alex had shown her earlier, drones filled the air flitting about the warehouse and scanning for movement.  They were maybe three feet in diameter, each with a rather dangerous weapon on top trained toward the cars.  More interestingly, the mech stalked back and forth its torso rotated ninety degrees toward the line of cars.  As it reached the end of its march, it turned and marched back, the torso rotating 180 degrees so it could continue to point an array of deadly weapons at the agents.

Alex pulled up to the end of the line of vehicles, her side of the car facing the mech.  “When you get out stay down.  That thing shoots at anyone who peeks their head up.  Any questions?”

“Somehow I’m supposed to help disarm a bomb while getting by a robot at which I can’t look?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“Fabulous.”  Lena unbuckled and popped open her door, stopping to fumbling with her shoes.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Removing my now useless footwear,” Lena replied with a huff of breath, unstrapping one and dropping it to the passenger floor as she began on the other.  “Someone was kind enough to render them pointless through her haphazard mistreatment of me.”

“Lady, shoes like that are always pointless.”

Turning on Alex, one stiletto heel in hand and flopping as she gestured, Lena replied, “Agent Danvers, my uniform is as necessary as yours.  You wear your armor.  I wear mine.  Trust that heels like this have helped close varied and sundry types of deals.  They’re as an important part of my arsenal as all of your…” Her gaze running over the weapons strapped to Alex, Lena lifted a brow.  “Oh, my.  That is a lot of guns.”

“Ugh, men.  I suppose they’re easily distracted by—”

“Men?” Lena smiled sharply.  “Please, Agent Danvers.  You, better than anyone, should know not to limit your thought process like that.”

“Oh, I…” As the CEO slid out of the car and onto the ground, Alex followed after her, a hand out to stop the closing door.  She landed in a squat next to the younger woman saying, “I can’t exactly use my door.  I’d be fodder.”

“Of course, and I’d miss your company terribly.”

In a crouched run, a new woman joined their position.  Her hair was dark and short, and she was dressed the same as Alex.  “Ma’am.  Miss Luthor, thank you for coming to assist us.”

Lena opened her mouth to respond but closed it with only a small sigh.

“Vasquez, update me,” Alex ordered.

“Yes, ma’am.  We’ve managed to hold this position as you ordered.  Technical support still hasn’t been able to access any of the systems of the drones or the mechs, but they are communicating with each other.  Occasionally, the drones enter the warehouse where we’ve been able to confirm the NCPD members are pinned down but only for a few minutes each.  We believe they’re rearming themselves in there.  We do know they’re rearming the mech.”

“Mother fucker,” Alex grumbled.  She pointed to a burnt out shell of a vehicle at the other end of the line.  “What happened there?”

“We took down one of the drones trying to slow down the rearmament process.  The mech called and then raised things on us.”

“Did anyone…?”

Vasquez shook her head.  “Injured but not killed, ma’am.  So far no fatalities.”

“How’s Supergirl?” Alex swallowed hard, eyes pleading.

“Bullets removed and under the mobile sunlamps.  She’s been asking about you.  Do you want to go see her?”

“I…” Alex’s gaze shifted to Lena, lingering, then back to Vasquez.

The other agent also eyed the CEO strangely before returning her gaze to her superior.

Brows furrowed, Lena looked back and forth uncertainly between the other two women, obviously missing something.

Clapping Agent Vasquez on the shoulder, Alex said, “I need to stay here with Miss Luthor.  Please go check on Supergirl for me.  Let her know I’m here.  I’m fine.  I’m going to keep an eye on Miss Luthor, and she and I will handle things out here.  Supergirl should just sit the rest of this one out.”

Eyebrows shooting up near her hairline, Vasquez grabbed Alex’s wrist. “You want me to tell Supergirl that you and Miss Luthor are going to take care of the robot that shot her out of the sky?”

Alex nodded.  “Consider it an order.”

“I need a raise,” Vasquez muttered.  “Yes, ma’am.  Right away ma’am.”  Hands clasping her superior’s shoulders, she leaned in suddenly.  “You owe me, Alex.”  Nodding toward Lena, she added, “Miss Luthor.”

As she watched Vasquez do a crouch-run away, Lena asked, “That seemed strange.  Was that strange?”

“Ah…so, any ideas on how to get past that thing?”

“You tell me, Agent 006.9,” Lena said sitting on the ground, her back against the car.  “This is my first rogue robot attack.  Well, if you don’t count college.”

“You had robots in college?”

“You didn’t?”

Shaking her head, Alex replied, “I’m a bio-engineer.”

“Ah, no bio in my engineering.  Well, outside of shooting people, what else do we know about this thing?”

“I’ll show you.  Don’t stand up.”  Alex stood, waiting the two seconds it took for the mech to focus in on her.

**_“Unauthorized personnel.  Terminate.”_ **

Alex ducked just as bullets riddled her vehicle.

“It seems it likes you just slightly more than I do, Agent Danvers.”

“Hysterical.”  Alex crouched back into position again.  “That’s what happens every time it catches sight of someone.  It calls out and then opens fire.”

“There seemed to be a slight delay.  Do you mind if I…?” She pointed up.

“You want to take a look?”

“No. I want to sit in my office and work on a rather lucrative contract until my next meeting, but that option is lost.  Since I’m here, let’s see if I can’t make myself useful, all right?”

Alex nodded.  “Don’t get yourself killed.  If anything happened to you, Kara would never forgive me.”

“That almost makes dying here worth it, but still I’ll try and avoid death.” Lena peeked over the hood of the car, waiting for some reaction but getting none.  She popped up and down quickly but didn’t get any real information.  Nodding to herself, she stood to get a real look at the mech.

“Be careful!” Alex said, grabbing Lena by the jacket and pulling the CEO back down with a ripping noise.

As she landing on the ground of the parking lot, Lena’s head whipped to the side and she stared daggers at Alex.

“You need to be careful, Miss Luthor.  That thing—”

“I need to be careful!?”  Unbuttoning her jacket, Lena peeled it off until she was only wearing her pencil skirt and the red silk camisole she’d been wearing underneath.  She pulled the jacket around holding it out in her hands so that the tear in the back was clearly visible.  “Look at this.  Look at what you did.  Do you see this?” Lena fairly hissed.

Alex blinked several times, but her attention wasn’t on the jacket.  It was on the camisole or more accurately what lie beneath.

“I can’t believe you,” Lena continue, not looking at the agent’s lack of attention, or attention, and continuing her rant.  “You’re a walking disaster area.  Just stay away from me.”  Pulling her cellphone out of the pocket of her jacket, Lena balled up the article of clothing and tossed it into Alex’s face, snapping the agent back into full attention.  “Now, I’m going to get a look at that damn robot out there.  As soon as it moves in my direction or says anything, I’ll be back behind the car.  I’m not suicidal.  You try and keep your hands off me.  I’m running out of articles of clothing, and I’d appreciate it if you don’t tear my shirt off, all right?”

“O…okay,” Alex stammered out as she nodded and dropped the jacket on the ground.

Lena nodded once in return before turning her back to the vehicle to ready herself.  Inhaling deeply, she nodded to herself and stood, looking around at the robot, the drones, the warehouse, allowing her quick mind to take it all in within her two-second window.  She was most of the way back to her crouch when the mech’s voice fully registered.

**_“Authorized personnel recognized: Lena Luthor.”_ **

Frozen, just the top of her head sticking up over the car, Lena grunted loudly.  “Oh, Lex, what did you do?”

As Lena’s gaze fell on hers, Alex asked, “It knows you?”

“Apparently,” Lena replied, her voice holding none of the excitement that she saw reflected in the agent’s face.  “Lex…he…I have no idea what the fuck this is.”

“But it knows you.  It didn’t shoot.”  Alex swallowed hard.  “Can you order it?”

Lena shrugged.  “I can try.  What do I say?”

“Tell it to stand down.”

Slowly rising to her full height again, Lena said, “Stand down.”  She cleared her throat, projecting, “Stand down!”

“Did it work?”

Again, Lena shrugged.

“Let me try.” Shuffling down to the other end of the car, Alex stood and took one step out.

**_“Unauthorized personnel.  Terminate.”_ **

“Fuck!” Alex dove back behind the car, landing at Lena’s feet.

“Hmmm.  Doesn’t seem like anyone likes you today, Agent Danvers.”

“Whatever.  What the fuck good are you if this thing doesn’t listen to you!?” Alex snapped.

“Well, don’t yell at me.  I didn’t volunteer to come down here.  If you’d prefer I leave—”

“I’m sorry.  I’m sorry.” Alex rubbed at her face with one hand.  “It’s just Maggie, and the bomb…people are going to die if we can’t stop this thing.  I’m in charge and my…Supergirl is…”  Alex looked down in surprise when a hand gently touched her other one.

“Is Kara out of the blast radius?”

“Uh…Kara won’t get stuck in this, I promise.”

“Good,” Lena replied, standing again.

**_“Authorized personnel recognized: Lena Luthor.”_ **

As Lena walked down toward the far end of the car, Alex scuttled after her.  “What are you doing?”

“Well, none of these things seem interested in shooting me thanks to Lex’s programming them before he decided I was the biggest threat next to the Supers.  You have people and a bomb in that warehouse.  Maybe I can walk right in there.”

Alex shook her head, Grabbing for Lena’s hand.  “That’s an awful idea.”

“You have a better one?” Lena asked, yanking her hand back.

“My sister will kill me,” Alex replied, making a grab for Lena’s ankle as the CEO rounded the tail of the vehicle.  “Miss Luthor.  Miss Luthor.  Lena!” Settling back against the vehicle, Alex covered her face with both hands.  “Damn, please don’t get killed out there.  If you do, Kara won’t have a chance to get to me.  I’ll probably do myself in.”

Ignoring the grabbing hands and calls of the agent, Lena strode in the general direction of the large purple and green robot.  One of the drones came close, hovering just in front of her for a moment before flying away again.  This caused a slight uptick in CEO’s already pounding heart, but she soldiered onward.  Lives were on the line, hundreds perhaps thousands of lives.  As Lena got closer to the mech, its size became apparent.  It stood about twenty feet tall, maybe six of that torso not counting the missiles that sat above it ready for launch.  It’s ‘heels’ were about a third of the way up its legs, kind of like a cat’s.  It moved as she moved, rotating slightly to keep her in view.

Drawing closer, Lena took a sharp left that would move her away from the mech and through an open area to the warehouse.  At first, this seemed like it would work.  Robot and drones alike just watched.  All at once, the mech turned and moved toward her even as four drones moved to intercept.  The fliers formed a line on Lena’s left side leading right, back toward the mech.  When she turned and tried to move away, they merely moved in the way again.  Eventually, they surrounded her, only leaving her one open path…toward the mech.

“Agent Danvers?!” Lena yelled to make herself heard back to the cars.

“Miss Luthor?!”

“I don’t seem to be given any options here!  The drones are moving me toward the robot!”

“Are you…?!” Alex glanced over the trunk of the car for a split second then ducked down again.  “Are you in any danger?!”

“Not yet!  I mean, I don’t seem to be!  It’s pretty obvious where they want me to go, though!  I can’t even go back the way I came!”

“Well, what do you want—?!”

“I’m going to the robot!” Lena announced.

“Are you sure?!”

“My other option is to stand out here until the bomb goes off, so right now the robot seems more desirable, yes!  I’m just trying to keep you updated!”

“All right!” Alex agreed.  “Just be careful!”

Moving forward again, Lena chuckled but without humor.  “Oh, I think we left caution behind us as soon as you started driving!  Do they really teach that in Quantico?!”

“It’s a defensive driving course, yes!” Alex agreed.

“Offensive driving?!” The smile Lena had plastered onto her face came through her voice.  “The next time rush hour traffic is being problematic; I’m calling you, Agent Danvers!”

“I tell you what; get us all through this alive, and you’ve got yourself a deal, Miss Luthor!”

Lena continued until she reached the robot, her head going further and further back to take in the size of the thing.  When she was about six feet away it moved and she stilled in response, her breath catching and her body tensing even further.  Its legs folded under it, allowing the mech to get much lower to the ground until the torso nearly touched.  With a hydraulic hiss, two panels in the front swung open toward Lena.  The first was clear and hinged open like a conventional door.  The second folded down toward the ground and had three step-like indentations leading to a cockpit interior.

Arms folded over herself, Lena shook her head and said, “Uh-uh.  Uh-uh.”

“Miss Luthor, what were those sounds?!” Alex called out from the relative safety of her vehicle.

“It…” Lena paused in an obvious search for the best descriptor of this moment.  “It wants me to get in!”

“What do you mean, ‘Get in’?!”

“I mean Get! In!” Even though no one but Lex’s killing machines could see her, Lena gestured up and into the mech with her hands.

Still no closer to understanding, Alex tried twice to glance over the back of the car before standing and gasping, immediately dropping back to the ground before anything there took her measure.  “Miss Luthor, do not, I repeat, do not get in that thing!”

“Oh, I’m not eager to do so, Agent Danvers!  Lex made this!  In my recent experience, everything my brother’s made tries to kill me!  Honestly, right now I’m still rather amazed I’m alive!  Clearly, this speaks of one of his earlier creations, a kinder, gentler Lex!”

“A kinder, gentler Lex?” Alex rolled her eyes.  “Miss Luthor, does the mech seem active right now?!”

“I’m not certain!  It’s definitely powered up if that’s what you’re asking!  I can see lights inside it, and I can hear the energy running through it!  It looks like it’s waiting, though!  I imagine it’s waiting for me!”

“Good!  Just stay right there!” Alex instructed.  “Alpha and Gama team, you’re on me!  We’re going to try and breach the perimeter!  Primary objective is diffusing the bomb!  Secondary objective is recusing the officers down inside!  Beta and Omega teams, provide cover fire!”

“Wait, are you coming out here?” Lena asked turning left and right, a drone blocking her no matter which way she turned.

“It will be fine, Miss Luthor!” Alex nodded to her team leaders.  “Remember, we have a friendly out there!   All right, move out!”

The DEO agents had gotten a few feet on either side of the vehicles when the mech raised its arms.  Drones reacted, flying in from all over.  Only the ones around Lena held steady.

**_“Unauthorized personnel.  Terminate.”_ **

The drones and mech all opened fire.  Bullets flew over Lena’s head.  DEO agents ran back behind cover, some struck by fire and then dragged back by their fellows.  Though the whole thing lasted less than thirty seconds, it was a spectacular failure.  All they’d managed to do was add a half-dozen agents to those already with the few in the ambulances.

“Miss Luthor?!”  Alex called out.  “Miss Luthor!?!”  Letting her head fall back and bang into the car, Alex closed her eyes.  “Miss Luthor, please if you can hear me—!!”

“What the fuck was that, Agent Danvers!?!” Lena replied as she uncurled from the protective ball she had created out of her body on the ground and stood.  She wiped at her suit for about two seconds before shaking her head in disgust and giving up completely.  “Perhaps your definition of ‘It will be fine.’ And mine differ, but that was certainly not fine!!”

“You’re okay!”

“Oh, no, I’m not okay!!  I’m fuming!!”

“Look, Miss Luthor, I know you’re scared, but—!”

“Oh, no, this isn’t what I sound like when I’m **scared**!” Lena snapped back.  “This is what I sound like when I’m planning a hostile takeover!  You, Agent Danvers, everything between us is hostile!”

There was a dull thud, hollow and concerning.  Not able to place it, Alex asked, “What’s that noise?!  Miss Luthor, are you doing something?!”

“Why yes, I’m getting into the robot my brother was kind enough to supply me!”

“What!?!  No!!  Miss Luthor, do not get into that thing.  We have no idea what will happen to you if you do.  Do not get in there, do you hear me!?!”

Stopped with one foot on the top step and one in the cockpit, Lena replied, “Agent Danvers, so far the only thing here that’s been a threat to me is you!  Right now I think the safest place for me might be inside the robot!  Anyway, it’s also the best chance we have of finding out what’s going on and diffusing the bomb! Wish me luck!”

“Miss Luthor, no!!  Miss Luthor!!”  There was another hydraulic hiss and a dull thud followed by a clang.  Alex glanced through her car windows just long enough to see the now-closed mech, with Lena Luthor inside, rising to its full height again.  Sliding to a sitting position on the ground again, Alex banged her head against the car three times.  “Fuck.  J’onn goes to The Fortress of Solitude for one day with Superman, leaves me in charge, Supergirl gets shot down by Luthor Tech, and now a Luthor is loose in National City in a giant mech.  Even if we do somehow survive this, I’ll be busted so low my job will be scrubbing toilets on a remote surveillance post in Antarctica…barefoot.”

As the doors closed behind her, they shut out most of the light, and Lena found herself inside a mech that wasn’t well lit, her eyes trying to adjust to the dim lighting.  There was a small viewing hatch that allowed a tiny bit of daylight to stream through, but most of the light was supplied by track light along the interior and around the controls and buttons.  After being outside, it wasn’t easy to see.  The fresh air was leaving quickly, and the smells of plastic and an electric burn were taking over quickly.  It took her mind back to robotics club in college.  She shuffled forward, her movements echoing in the tiny interior.

Lena sat down in what didn’t look too unlike a very comfy gaming chair, closing the four-point harness in place for safety.  There were pedals at the base of the chair, though they were obviously set for Lex’s much longer legs.  As she sat, they shortened up for her length.  On the right armrest was a joystick with a trigger and several buttons, but moving it didn’t do anything.  On the left side was a throttle stick with a large button on the interior.  She moved the stick front and back, tempted to but not pressing the button until she knew more.

Above her, Lena grabbed the periscope setup, but tugging on it didn’t move it so much as a centimeter.  On her left was a flatscreen that didn’t seem to have any way for Lena to input data to it.  On her right was a smaller screen with a keyboard underneath.  When she grabbed it, she was able to swivel the whole setup, so it moved in front of her and locked into place.  She explored two indents on the far right, one deep and circular and one smaller and rectangular toward the front, with her fingers.

Peering into each she said, “Huh, a spot for a cellphone and a drink holder.  Really, a drink holder?  Exactly what did you expect people to be doing in here, Lex?”  Shrugging, she stuck her cellphone into place, noticing it fit securely, receiving power and a strong signal.  As Lena explored the interior with her eyes, the mech suddenly shifted. 

 _“Unauthorized personnel.  Terminate.”_ This time when the voice spoke, it was in quieter tones.

The mech’s weapons raised and fired.  The CEO found the soundproofing inside was excellent.  Though she could hear the weapons being fired, it wasn’t unpleasant.  The vibrations weren’t even bad.  Though the mech was an awful combination of colors on the outside, it seemed to be built for comfort.  She looked up just in time to see an agent dive back behind the car she had been hiding behind earlier, assuming it was Agent Danvers once again testing boundaries.

Lena tried several of the controls inside, but the only thing that responded to her was the keyboard.  Her keystrokes lit up the small screen in front of her, and she quickly began to travel into the system.  As she did so, her eyes were drawn to the clock counting down until the bomb exploded.  Grabbing the phone from her pocket, she unlocked it.  Placing it on the side, Lena hit Kara’s number while she continued to type.  When it went to voicemail, the CEO frowned deeply, but a smile returned at the blonde’s bubbly voice.

“Hey, you’ve reached the voicemail of Kara Danvers because, well, I’m not available.  If I were available, I’d totally answer your call, of course.  I’d never let your call go to voicemail on purpose, not even if you were a telemarketer.  I mean, that’s a hard job.  People must be super rude to telemarketers, and that’s not fair.  If I were a telemarketer, I wouldn’t want someone to be rude to me.  So if you are a telemarketer—”

Alex’s voice broke through the babble. “Kara, just tell them to leave a message, and you’ll call them back.”

“Oh, okay.  Um, please leave a message, and I’ll call you back.”  Then Kara whispered, “Even if you’re a telemarketer.”  Beep!

Despite the situation, Lena was smiling broadly.  She kept typing as she spoke.  “Hello, I’m calling to see if you might want to change your cell phone plan.”  Lena laughed.  “Seriously, though, Kara, this is Lena.  I was hoping to catch you, but maybe this is better.  Don’t erase this message, okay, at least not until you see me in person either tonight or tomorrow.  I’m just…I’m with your sister, and we’re in the middle of something.  It could be a bit, at least half an hour, but I expect there will be some paperwork and…The important part is I wanted you to know I’m thinking of you.  Right now, at this moment, you’re my best friend, and I’m thinking of you.  No matter what, I want you to live your life to the fullest and be happy.  You’re an incredible person, and you deserve that.  I feel lucky to have had you in my life.  Take care.”

Lena disconnected the call, going back to her busy typing.  It took a few minutes of searching, but Lena found a program with her name embedded in it.  It had familiar looking subroutines, things she had helped Lex program when they were kids.  She shook her head, worming her way in further and trying not to enjoy herself too much even though this brought her back.  Finally, feeling like she was on the right trail, she launched the program, startling when the larger screen to her left lit up, and a familiar face and voice filled the area.

“Hey, Lee, long time no see. If you're watching this, then I didn't save the world from the alien scourge.  Won’t Mom be mad.”  Lex Luthor’s face leaned closer to the screen, pouting before he leaned back with his ever familiar and charming grin.  “I guess it's your turn now, but you have to earn it.  Let's play a game like we did when we were kids.  Guess what we get to play?  You have three guesses, and the first two don’t count.”

“L…Lex?”  Lena gasped, swallowing hard.  “Oh, my God, Lex?”

“That’s right, chess!”  Lex laughed.  “You always were the smart one, Lee.  I wonder what you’re doing now.  Did you cure cancer yet?  More money in treating it if you ask me, and we Luthors are in the business of making money.  With me gone, someone’s got to take over Luthor Corp and Mom would be a disaster.  I hope they put you in charge.  You’ve got my vote.  Oh, except I’m dead.  Oops.”  Lex laughed again.

“It’s a recording.”  Lena nodded to herself.  “I knew that.  You’re just a re—”

When Lena’s phone rang back, a facetime request from Kara, the CEO jerked at the sound.  Rather distracted, Lena accepted the call, her attention still split between the smaller screen ahead of her and her brother’s now frozen grinning face.

“Kara, darling, so nice to hear from—”

“Did you just try and shoot me!?”

“Kara?” Slowly, Lena turned her head.  The angry face of Agent Danvers was staring back at her.  “Oh, of course.  It’s you.”

“Did you?”

“It wasn’t me.  It was the suit robot thing,” Lena said, most of her attention now returned to her typing.

“You’re in the suit robot thing!”

“Both of these things can be true.”  As she pressed a key, the Lex recording began to move again.  “Agent Danvers now is a bad time.  I’m trying to run a program Lex has left for me, and he’s been telling me that—”

“Wait, is Lex talking to you?”

Shooting Alex the stink eye, Lena picked up the phone and pointed it at the screen showing Alex the recording of Lex.

 “And then…and then there was the time we made that fire retardant gel, covered your hand it in, set your hand on fire, and yelled for help until the nanny came running in!”  Lex was laughing so loudly he was crying.  “You were what, six?  Oh God!  Oh God!”  He rubbed at the tears on his face.  “She went screaming out of the room, looking for a fire extinguisher, and then Mother came in.  Mother just looked at us, shook her head, and said, ‘Do you know how hard it is to find a good nanny?  No dessert tonight for either of you.  Lex, put your sister out.’  Then she strolled out of the room.”  Screeching with laughter, he yelled, “Classic!”

When Lena turned the phone to face her again, placing it back where it had been sitting earlier, an obviously horrified Alex Danvers asked, “Did Lex really set you on fire and…did you really…I…?”

Lena shrugged, beginning to type again.  “I was six.  He was my big brother, and he was fifteen.  It was a science experiment.  It was completely safe.  We used all of the proper protocols.”  When neither of them seemed convinced, Lena added, “Perhaps I should have realized something was wrong with Lex sooner but—”

“You were six,” Alex said.

Lena nodded, looking over at the recording of Lex, who was still babbling about something else from their childhood, for just a moment before returning to her keyboard.  “Anyway, Agent Danvers, I didn’t try to shoot you.  I can’t control this thing, at least not yet.  So far all I’ve been able to do is bring up this recording of Lex, and he wants me to play a game of chess with him.”

“Why?”

“You’re going to love this.”

“That’s sarcasm,” Alex noted.

“That keen intellect is why you’re in the FBI.  Lex says it’s my turn to save the world from the alien scourge.  My hope is—”

“That if you win, you get all of his toys?”

Lena shrugged.  “That would be nice.”

“Can you beat Lex in chess?”

With a grin as she typed, Lena replied, “In my sleep.  The time limit is the thing.  I’m hoping this is a timed game.”

“Chess is timed?”

With a sideways glare, Lena reached out to the phone.  “Goodbye, Agent Danvers.”  Stopping just short of disconnect, she asked, “Wait, how did you get Kara’s phone?  I thought you said she was clear of the blast radius.”

“Oh yeah uh…she must have dropped her phone in my car earlier.  I heard it ringing, saw it was you, and realized I had a way to communicate with you.  Lucky thing.”

“Indeed.  Goodbye, Agent Danvers.”  This time Lena did disconnect, returning her full attention to her typing as she searched out something having to do with chess.  She didn’t expect to find chess.  That was too simple.  This was the first leg of his game.  She searched, looking for any number of well-known moves and even some of the more abstract ones.  Suddenly, a word jumped out at her, and her fingers fairly flew along the keyboard.

Chaturanga was the precursor of chess in northern India in the sixth century during the Gupta Empire.  The word translated into ‘four divisions (of the military)’.  It referenced the infantry, cavalry, elephantry, and chariotry.  As soon as she saw chaturanga, Lena knew she had found what she needed.

“Excellent, Lena!” Lex Luthor laughed again, but his face had shifted to a new recording.  “Now it’s time to play our game.  Are you as excited as I am?  I bet you are.  I bet you’re thinking you’re going to beat your old brother, Lex.  You always were such a good chess player, Lena.  It was like you had a supercomputer for a brain.  I’ve always loved you, Lee, always been proud of you, but when you’re thirteen, and you teach a four-year-old to play chess, she isn’t supposed to win.  You know, there were times I actually wondered if you were human.”

Something changed in Lex’s face, the smile sliding away and nothing but the madman remaining, and Lena swallowed hard.  She pressed her hands against the rigid and inescapable surroundings.  The only sound was the thudding of her heart, building, rising, and increasing in tempo.  That was the face of the Monster of Metropolis, the man who had taken her brother from her as well as the lives of hundreds of others.  He was trapped in a prison of brick and steel now, in a prison of his own mind, and she was trapped in a prison of his design at this moment as surely as she was trapped in the prison of her last name.  Her every goodly action perhaps a motion toward her parole.

Suddenly, Lex’s grin split his face again.  “Okay, Lee, let’s play that game of chess.”

Lena’s breath shuddered out of her body, her first awareness that she’d been holding it.  “Yes, let’s.”

“We’re not playing just chess though,” Lex said.  “We’re playing…wait for it…four-player chess!”  He laughed.  “Exciting, right?”

Lena rolled her eyes.  “As if I can’t kick your ass at four-player chess.  The normal variation or Bughouse?”

“I bet you wonder if we’re playing Bughouse?”

Lena nodded.

“Nah!  If you’re here, there’s probably a bomb about to go off.  Bughouse can go on forever.”

“A moment of sanity?  Who expected that?  I suppose I shall be grateful for small favors.”

The smaller screen changed, and a four-player chessboard appeared.  It looked like a normal chessboard except there were an additional three rows, each eight rows in width, extending behind the board on each players side.  Four different colored chess pieces appeared at the furthest back places on the board, leaving one empty row in front of them before the normal play board existed.

Lex’s talking head burst into action again.  “You’ll allow me the first move, won’t you Lee?  After all, you’ve always been the better chess player.  So good.  So good.  Give your poor brother a leg up here, won’t you?”  He grinned, the line between charm and madness definitely toggling toward the insane.  “Excellent!  You’ve always been such a good sport.  Well, here we go.  I’ll try to keep up, but don’t take it easy on me just because I’m dead.”

One of the pawns on the screen, a white piece, slid out two spaces and into gameplay.

Lena nodded, a smile ghosting her lips.  This she knew.  Chess she knew, and she’d been mastering it since the day she was introduced to the game.  It was logic, inspiration, outmaneuvering your opponent, a game of war for the civilized woman.  It was so much at which Lena Luthor had excelled her whole life, that which she’d been born and raised to do.  This game, four-player chess, was only a slightly different variant than the original.  It was either played by teams of two or by two people, each controlling the pieces on their opposite side.  If by teams it could become quite a challenge if one wasn’t allowed to communicate with one’s teammate.  However, if you were communicating with the other part of your team and you two could strategize properly, or in this case, if you controlled both sets of pieces, it just meant you had more pieces at your disposal.  This variant allowed for a few changes in that if one side is in checkmate the game is not over, their pieces are merely frozen.  Their partner may seek to free them from the checkmate.  You don’t lose until both sets of your pieces are in checkmate.  Of course, pawns do not travel in such a way that they can reach the side of the board, so it will be up to the larger pieces, as it usually is, to resolve the game.

Fingers linked together, Lena stretched her arms out releasing some tension from fingertip all the way up to her neck.  “All right.  Let’s do this, Lex.  You know, I didn’t think I’d ever have the pleasure of trouncing you at chess again.  If I survive this, I’ll have to find a way to thank you.  Heh.  Maybe this time I’ll send a drone to visit you.”

Lena type in the command, naming first the pawn and then the square.  She watched, satisfied, as her red pawn slid forward.  Next, it was Lex’s turn, and he moved a black pawn, advancing it onto the playing field.  Lena typed in turn, her brow furrowing when nothing happened.  However, seconds later, a different green pawn did shuffle forward one space.

“What… What the hell?”

As one of Lex’s white pieces began to move, signifying the beginning of the second turn, the screen with his face launched into action again and he spoke.  “Hey, Lee, so at this point, you may have noticed something you don’t like. Yeah, you’re smart like that.  You’re too good at chess, way too good, so I’ve given you a teensy little handicap.” Hand held up to the screen, Lex held his thumb and forefinger perhaps a half inch apart before dropping his hand again, his impish face returning front and center.  “The AI will be controlling your other set of pieces.  I programmed it myself, though I have to admit, it isn’t my finest programming.  Though, hey, didn’t you say you could beat me at chess with your eyes closed.  Now’s your chance to prove it.”  Lex chuckled.

“Oh, you son of a bitch.  No, really, Mom’s a total bitch, an insane bitch, and you’re her son.”  Head leaning back, Lena looked up at the ceiling about a foot away.  “Fuck!”

Lex’s voice pulled her back to the game.  “It’s your move, Lee.”

“Oh, God.” 

Sitting forward again, Lena’s studied the screen for just a moment before her fingers danced over the keyboard once again.  She watched Lex’s black piece move then grumbled at the choice the AI made for her green piece.  When it was the turn for Lex’s white piece again, his move wasn’t unexpected.  This was the process, understanding and predicting the moves of the other players and planning several moves ahead for them.  This is where Lena excelled, and she could do this, she could even learn to do this for the AI playing her green pieces.  She just needed time.  The question was, did she have that time.

It was over twenty minutes later, and Lena was getting a good handle on the game.  Several pieces had been claimed on both sides, and the CEO felt like she was maneuvering things on the right direction toward victory.  Time was her biggest challenge right now.  The AI playing on her side had been checkmated once, and she’d been tempted to leave it there where its ham-fisted playing couldn’t cause any problems.  However, that gave Lex two turns to her one, so she’d freed the thing and returned the number of plays to two-to-two.  When her phone rang again, another facetime request from Kara, Lena smiled briefly but then frowned upon realizing it was the older, not the younger Danvers sister calling.

Finger hesitating before responding, Lena finally pushed the button to answer the call.  “What!?”

“You okay?” Alex asked.

“Are you fucking serious!?”

“Okay, that was a stupid question,” Alex admitted.  “I just meant, the way you answered the phone didn’t seem like you.”

“Agent Danvers, you know nothing about me.”

“Your move, Lee,” Lex said.  “Hey, remember the time you brought home that kitten, Mom found out, and I tried to convince her it was part of some kind of science experiment so you could keep it?  Whatever happened to that kitten?”

Looking up from the chessboard, Lena met Lex’s smiling face as she somberly replied, “I had to give it away.  Mother said she’d already taken in one little orphan.  She wasn’t taking in another.”

“I’m sorry, Miss Luthor, was that to me?  I didn’t hear all of that,” Alex said.

“No, Agent Danvers, I was speaking to my…” Hand partially outstretched in the tight space, Lena pointed at screen showing Lex’s face.  She dropped her hand to her lap with a slight head shake.  “Agent Danvers, was there something you wanted, or did you just run out of people out there to annoy?”

“Well, it’s a time check, Miss Luthor.”

“Time check?”

Alex nodded.  “I have my orders.  We need to get you out of there.”

Lena chuckled, mostly returning her attention to the game.  “That would be lovely.  Do you have any suggestions on how we go about that?”

“Well, isn’t there some way you can…?”

When Alex didn’t finish her thought, Lena looked over at the phone again.  “I can what?  Do you think I have some giant eject button or a hatch release lever in here or something?  Agent Danvers, in case you don’t watch the news, my brother is madder than a March Hare.  No, the game is pretty simple.  I play a game of chess, with his poorly programmed AI for a partner.  I win and supposedly all of this, the right to be his successor and kill aliens in the Luthor name, is mine.  I lose, and I’m trapped here until the bomb goes off.”

“Poorly programmed AI?”

With a sigh, Lena lifted the phone and turned it toward the screen with the chess board.  “Lex controls the black and white pieces.  I’m red, and the AI plays green which are also on my side, though they’re playing poorly.”  She returned the phone to its resting place.  “If Lex were playing fair, I’d be able to control the green pieces, and I’d be out of here by now.  He decided I could use a handicap since he knows I can kick his ass in any and all chess variants.  So, he programmed an AI to play on my side, and it’s sloppy.  I’m ahead now and moving forward.  Time is a factor, as you’ve said.  I’m running out of time.  I don’t know if I can beat him in the…” Lena glanced at the clock.  “Fuck, twenty-three minutes remaining.  Well, at least I won’t have to go to another board meeting.  There’s always a silver lining.”

“Miss Luthor, I have my orders to get you out of there.”

“Well, feel free.  Grab a crowbar and run out here.  Do mind the bullets from the drones and this thing I’m in, but I won’t try and stop you.  No heroes here.”  Lena typed again, making her next move.

“Haha!” Lex laughed loudly.  “Nice one, Lee.  You took my bishop.  I should have seen that coming.  You’ve always been the sneakiest Luthor, though.  The rest of us, we’re heavy-handed, but you’re subtle.  It makes you the most dangerous.  I guess I’m glad you’re the one that’s left.  You’ll play it differently than I did.  You’ll lull the Supers into a false sense of security, befriend them, gain their trust, get to know them intimately, and that will be their downfall.  I may have been charming, but everyone always described you as seductive.  It was kind of a creepy word for my little sister, even an adoptive sister, but I can see the use for it now.  Make us proud.”

Lena glanced over at the phone, waiting to see if that got a reaction from the Agent, but Alex either didn’t hear or care.  Clearing her throat, Lena said, “Agent Danvers, I need you to do something for me.”

“Anything, just ask,” Alex replied immediately.

“It’s about Kara.”

“Fuck…Kara.” Alex hung her head.  “I promised Kara I’d get you out of here.  We need to get you out of here.”

“You spoke to Kara?”

Looking at Lena again, Alex replied, “I did, and she’s very worried about you so—”

“How?  You have her phone.”  Lena typed again, setting up her next move, a little smile in the corner of her mouth as Lex did the expected.

“Oh well…fuck.  Look, I’ll explain when we get you out of here.  I think we owe you a nice, long conversation.  Kara will probably appreciate getting this off her chest.  Anyway, I promised Kara I’d get you out of here.  She’ll never forgive me for dragging you into this if anything happens to you.”

A rush of air escape Lena in a half laugh.  “I was just thinking something similar.”

“Look, you have every right to blame me, Miss Luthor,” Alex agreed.

“That’s not what I mean.” Lena made her next move.

“Sneaky, Lee, sneaky,” Lex said, his grin widening as he waggled his finger at her.  “That reminds me of the time you were ten, and I snuck you out of the house and took you to my university to help me program our entry into the Robotics Initiative.  I still remember the looks on my teammates’ faces when they came in and found us in the dorm.  You and me sitting on the floor together, me drinking screwdrivers and you drinking orange juice, both of us laughing and working together.  I said, ‘Gentlemen and Ladies, allow me to introduce you to the greatest engineering mind this world will ever know, my little sister, Lena Luthor!’  Oh, those were good times.  You stayed and watched us trounce the other entrants, hung out for the after party, and I drove you home at the end of the weekend.  Mother never did call the police because you were missing, did she?”  Lex giggled.  “Oh, Mother, you odd duck.  She was usually so strict with you Lee, and then sometimes she acted like she just didn’t care if you lived or died.  Oh, well.”

Lena sparred Lex a glance, then went back to studying the chessboard while she spoke to Alex.  “Agent Danvers, I need you to gather up your agents, take Supergirl, and all leave.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“You heard me.  None of you can do anything to help with this situation.  If I beat Lex’s game, then I’ll call you.  If I don’t…” Looking at Alex, Lena shrugged.  “Well, if I don’t, I assume the explosion will be your confirmation of my failure.  Either way, people hanging around out there aren’t helping the situation any, so please leave.”

“You just wait a minute!  If you think for one moment that I’m going to—!”

“What I think is that your sister needs you, Agent Danvers!” Lena stared into the phone, gaze locked with Alex’s.  “Kara has already lost her whole family once.  She doesn’t talk about it much, and maybe that’s more telling than if she did.  It hurts.  She’s in pain, and she can’t afford to lose any more of her family.  Kara needs you, so get yourself out of the blast radius of this bomb.”

Lena moved, and Lex said, “What are you up to now, Lee?  Hmmm.  I suppose I’ll have to make my moves to find out.  Care to give me a clue?  No?  Hey, Lee, do I have a nice tombstone?  Do people recognize me as a hero?  Do they understand what I was trying to do for them?  Do you visit me, bring me flowers?  You understand, right?  That’s why you’re here.  We’re going to be a team again, Lee.  We’re going to be together again.  Even in death, I won’t abandon you.”

Eyes closed, Lena willed the tears back.  When she opened them, she was back in control.  “Trust me, Agent Danvers, losing a sibling, even one not related by blood…as far as you know, is devastating.  Kara needs you.  Be a good big sister, and take care of her.  Do the right thing and leave.”

Without a moment’s hesitation, Alex replied, “Kara needs you too.”

“Perhaps, but I think it’s I that needs Kara more.  Kara has many people in her life if something happens to me.  Make sure you’re one of them.  Goodbye, Agent Danvers.”

“Miss Luthor, don’t—”

Disconnecting the phone, Lena returned her full attention to the game at hand.  It was several minutes before movement outside caught her attention.  Fist the one remaining ambulance and then cars began to pull away.  Smiling slightly, the young Luthor returned to her game.  She could count the minutes left in the teens now.  Those were either minutes toward victory or minutes left in her life.  She pushed either thought out of her mind and only focused on the game, on several moves in advance.  That was the path toward victory.

Finally, with eleven minutes left, she managed to lockdown Lex’s black king. “Checkmate,” Lena said with a grin.

“Checkmate!” Lex echoed.  “Well done, Lee.  “Now, can you get my white king before I free my black king?”

“Oh, please do try and free your black king, Lex.  I’m rather counting on it.”  Lena continued to play for another three minutes, maneuvering things exactly as she wanted, until her phone rang.  Seeing it was Alex Danvers, calling under Kara’s name, she answered.  “Is everyone out safely?”

“Pretty much.”

“Pretty much?  What does that mean?”  Lena looked out the window of the mech, seeing one vehicle sitting alone on the hardtop.  “Is that you!?”  A hand popped up from inside the vehicle, waving, then disappeared again.  “Son of a bitch!”  Grabbing the phone, Lena looked at what was clearly the face of a supine Alex Danvers.  “What the hell are you thinking!?”

Alex shrugged.  “I’m thinking you shouldn’t be stuck in there with only the insane ramblings of your brother’s recordings.  I thought I’d just hang out.”

“I told you that Kara—!”

“Kara agreed with me.  She wasn’t happy, but I convinced her to leave, and she—”

“Kara was here!?”

Alex winced.  “Yes.  Like I said, I’ll explain it all when you get out of here.  Kara agreed that you shouldn’t be alone, and since she was in no shape to stay, I am.”

Placing the phone back on the mech, Lena gently asked, “Kara’s hurt?”

“She’ll be okay.  I promise.”

“But she’s hurt.”

“Yes, but it isn’t anything that you need to worry about.  I’m not worried about her.  I’m worried about you, but not Kara.  I swear.”

Typing her next move, Lena squinted at Alex.  “Agent Danvers, I think we’ve already established that you’re a liar.  Your promises don’t mean much to me.”

Nodding, Alex said, “That’s fair.  If I thought my little sister wasn’t going to make it, I wouldn’t be this calm.  I’m not that good a liar.  No one is.”

“Oh, Lee, I didn’t see that move coming.  Have you gotten better at chess, or have I gotten worse?” On screen, Lex Luthor rubbed a hand over his head, lips tight before he smiled again.  “Lee, you’re going to be amazing.  You’re going to make this world a better place for humanity.  Mom’s going to be so proud.  She’s going to love you so much, Lee, so much.”  Reaching up, he put his fingertips against the screen.

Mirroring the action, Lena placed her fingertips against the screen, finding only coldness, hard and unforgiving plastic.  It was an interesting metaphor for her relationship with Lex now.  It was cold, hard, and unforgiving, a screen between what lay beneath the surface and made it tick.

Dropping her hand, Lena said, “Yes, I suppose no one’s that good a liar.  So, what is it you want now, Agent Danvers?  I’m a little busy at the moment, but I have an opening in my schedule in about fifteen minutes and could probably squeeze you in then.”

Alex barked out a laugh.  “Good one.  I just want to keep you company.  You know, be here.  I’ll be quiet so you can concentrate, but if you want to talk, you tell me, okay?”

“Plus this way you can be near your girlfriend.”

“Yes, but that’s not the only reason I’m here,” Alex assured the CEO.  “I’m here for you, Miss Luthor.  You’re not alone.  I’m not going anywhere.  You won’t be alone.”

Meeting Alex gaze, Lena nodded.  “Noted, and thank you, Agent Danvers.”

“No problem.  Now, I’m just going to relax, earn my fat government paycheck, and wait here for you to save a whole lot of people.  Let me know if you need anything.”

“Sure, no pressure,” Lena smirked.

Typing again, she moved another piece, chasing Lex’s queen into a precarious position.  It could take her out, but it would be lost.  However, he had time on his side.  The next few moves were fast and furious, Lena’s mind working overtime as she moved closer to her goal.  She barely stifled her chortle of joy when Lex was forced to sacrifice his white queen to save his king.  She glanced at the time, wiping at her brow but feeling more confident that she’d win the game within the allotted time span.  She only worried that there was another part, maybe a diffusion of a bomb, that was also part of this whole countdown process.

**“Lena Luthor.”**

At an odd voice, Lena turned to look at the screen that showed Lex’s face.  However, Lex was gone.  In his place was the face of a woman, alien in nature.  Her skin was blue, and her features fine.  Black hair hung down past her shoulders, and her eyes glowed with a faint golden hue.  She wore a golden headdress with a ruby stone in the center, gold loop earrings, and several loops of gold necklace.  Her purple and blue hooded robe was trimmed in gold.

Staring into the face on the screen, Lena said, “Annnnd I’m fucked.  Okay, Lex, what insane head trip are you planning on taking me on for the last…” She glanced at the timer on the other screen before returning to the game. “…Four minutes and thirty-eight seconds of my life?  Well, at least I won’t have to suffer with whatever the fuck this is for too long.”

 **“Lena Luthor,”** the face on the screen repeated, **“I am the goddess Rama Kushna.  I am the mistress of the city of Nanda Parbat, and I rule over the scales of balance and karma.  I believe you to be out of balance.”**

“Uh-huh.  And I rule over L-Corp and believe you to be a fantastic part of my brother’s insanity plea.”  Tapping at the keys for her next move, Lena’s eyes widened, and her breath came faster when nothing happened.  “No.  No, no, no!  What the fuck, Lex!  You’ve shut me out!  You fucking cheater!  You God damn fucking cheater, no!”

**“Lena Luthor, this is not your brother’s doing.  One of my many gifts is time manipulation.  I have merely stopped time for all other beings on this planet so that you and I may converse freely.”**

Checking the time on the countdown again, Lena saw it was still showing four minutes and thirty-eight seconds.  Slowly she turned to the face of the blue woman on the screen.  “Are you a recording?”

**“No.”**

Head jerking back, Lean didn’t respond.  Instead, she fumbled for her phone.  “Agent Danvers.  Agent Danvers.  God damn it, answer—” Peering more closely showed Alex Danvers unmoving, unchanged, not even seeming to breathe.  In a bit of a panic, Lena tried to calm herself as she put the phone back and leaned forward, trying to see as far out the window of the mech as she could.  None of the drones moved, but they weren’t hovering.  They were merely frozen in place.  Even more convincing were the few birds in the sky in the same situation.  “…oh my God,” Lena muttered.

 **“Goddess,”** Rama Kushna corrected.

“Uh-uh-uh,” Lena’s breath stuttered out before she regained full control.  “Goddess, yes, of course.  Well, goddess, what can I do for you?”

**“Lena Luthor, it is what I can do for you.  At this moment, you are at a crossroads, and I am here to show you what your future will be like if you do not defeat your brother’s game.”**

“My future?”  Lena quirked an eyebrow.  “I won’t have a future if I don’t beat this insane game my brother has set up for me.  Apparently, you’re not aware, but there’s a bomb set to go off and take out God…uh…goddess knows how many city blocks if we don’t diffuse it.  So I either win or die.”

**“Incorrect.”**

“Incorrect?”

Rama Kushna nodded.

“Fucking Alex Danvers,” Lena grumbled.

**“Alexandra Danvers communicated to you what she believed to be true and accurate.  Unfortunately, she was working with the limited information she was able to gain from the viewing device the DEO was able to use to access the warehouse housing the bomb and from your brother himself.  Your brother lied.”**

“Shocking.  So there is no bomb?”

Continuing, Rama Kushna said, **“There is a bomb, but the explosion is set to create a force that will not destroy property and kill people for several city blocks in any direction.  The explosion will be smaller, controlled, merely killing those within the warehouse.  You and Agent Danvers won’t be harmed.  The explosion is merely a dispersal agent for the Kryptonite.”**

“Oh.”  Lena nodded.  “That sounds like Lex.  So how far will—?

**“Given this location, low levels of Kryptonite radiation will contaminate most of National City, Paradise Hill, Lincoln Park, Mountain View, and parts of Barrio Logan and Encato.  It will be thousands of years before these areas are habitable by Kryptonians again.”**

It took several moments of open-mouthed staring before Lena replied, “Supergirl.  Supergirl will—”

**“Move.  She’ll move to San Diego initially so she can stay close to friends and family, but heavy winds will bring with it sickness which will force her to move further away.  Eventually, she settles in Los Angeles.  It’s still close enough to family that they can visit, you can all visit, but her health won’t be threatened by the proximity of your brother’s…gift.”**

“I can visit?  I don’t think Supergirl and I are exactly that close.”

With a slow nod, Rama Kushna said, **“You will be.”**

“Wait a moment; you said DEO before.  Who’s the DEO?”

**“The Department of Extranormal Operations.  That is where Agent Danvers works.”**

“She works for the FBI.”  When the blue-faced woman didn’t respond, Lena said, “Right she lies a lot.  What was I thinking?  Well, thank you for this little…whatever this was, but I’d really like to stop my brother from contaminating several cities on the west coast with Kryptonite and killing the people in that warehouse.  So, if you don’t mind, could you please give me back control of my system?  I’m three moves from double-checkmate here.”

**“No.”**

“Of course not.” Lena sighed, resting her cheek on her hand.  “Look, goddess, Rama Kushna.  Do you mind if I call you Rama Kushna?”

The goddess shook her head slightly.

“Rama Kushna, this is all very impressive.  I mean, time control.  Wow.  Do you have any idea what I could do with time control?  Do you know how productive I would be?  I might actually get a weekend off before I retire.  That would be…hmmm.  I have no idea what that would be like.  What do people do on weekends off?”

The goddess shrugged.

“Right, I’m asking the wrong deity.  Anyway, this has been interesting, but I have some lives to save and a bomb to stop, so please go back to your city and your worshipers.  I’m not interested in whatever it is you’re peddling.”

**“You’re not even curious?”**

“Of course I’m curious.  I’m human.  We’re all curious.  I’m also a Luthor which makes me entirely untrustworthy.  You shouldn’t talk to me.  You definitely shouldn’t deal with me.  Lead me not into temptation.  I’ll find my own way there.”  Lena waved the back of her hands at the screen, shooing the goddess away.

**“Well, my course of action is clear then.”**

“I’m glad we can agree that—”

The face and one shoulder of the goddess leaned out of the screen, her hand reaching toward Lena.  **“Lena Luthor, I will show you your future should you fail to stop the bomb.”**

“Fuck!  Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!” Feet scrapping and hands desperately grabbing for purchase, Lena tried to escape the hand in the limited space.  Right before it touched she closed her eyes, and then darkness took her.


	2. They Say No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

“Ooof!” As a weight hit her chest, Lena’s eyes flew open.  One arm slapped down colliding with something soft, the other pinned under the rest of whatever had struck her.  Panicked, remembering the hand of the goddess reaching out for her, Lena scrambled backward dragging the heaviness along with her.  She felt something grip her shoulder as something else put pressure on her legs.  Just when the fear was becoming overwhelming, confusion replaced it.

“Mommy!”  The voice was young.  “Mommy, wake up, it’s breakfast time.”

A boy, in the three to five range, though Lena was not an expert, climbed up Lena’s torso until his face became so close to hers as go out of focus.  Shaggy brown hair hung over equally brown eyes, and he gripped her cheeks between his chubby palms.  Leaning even closer, he planted a somewhat sloppy kiss on her lips and pushed back, a smile of pure adoration appearing on his face as he beamed down at her.

“Oh, Dear God.  What’s going on?”

“It’s your birthday!” The child responded, his enthusiasm still unbridled.  “It’s time for birthday pancakes!  Come on.  Come on.  Get up!”  Sliding off of Lena revealed he was actually fairly slender and wearing tan footy Pajamas with puppy dog faces all over them.  The boy took Lena’s hand in an attempt to lead the less than eager CEO from the bed, but she wasn’t coming easily.  Instead, she sat up, allowing her eyes to explore the room.

The bedroom was large, but it wasn’t the one in her penthouse.  The furniture here was a light oak, the walls a silvery gray.  Light streamed through the wall to ceiling sliders that opened to a balcony.  She slid her fingers across the soft duvet cover which was totally unfamiliar, but the rest of the room nagged at her.  Though the furnishings seemed out, it still felt like part of her.

Finally, giving into the child’s urgings, Lena climbed out of bed and turned a bit as she took a few steps through the room.  Whatever had been tickling at the back of her mind became more solid.  “Wait, we’re in National City.  This is my home, house, in National City, isn’t it?”  She looked down for confirmation at the boy who only looked up at her, seemingly confused at the question.

“Did you have a nightmare, Mommy?” He asked.

“Definitely,” she replied.

Wrapping his arms around her legs, he rested his head against her waist and said, “It’s all right, Mommy.  I’ve got you.”

The gesture was sweet and oddly comforting, and Lena reached down stroking the little boy’s hair.  “Thank you.”

“Do you feel better?” He asked, looking up at her.

“Actually, I do.”

“Good.  Birthday pancake time.”

“Birthday pancakes?” Lena shook her head, allowing herself to be led by the hand but pausing when she caught sight of her reflection.  Though she wasn’t old by any means, she was older.  One hand pressed against the dresser top, she leaned closer to the mirror.  Laugh lines touched the outside of her mouth and the corners of her eyes.  The words crow’s feet weren't accurate, definitely laugh lines and she smiled, showing she was right.  “Good Lord.  How old am I?”

“Thirty-five.”

Jerking her head back, she looked down at the child.  “Thirty-five?”

He nodded.

“Thirty-five,” she repeated.  Looking into the mirror again, her smile returned.  She stood upright, turning to examine herself more fully.  Her nightie was dark green and hung to about knee-length.  It was a bit more modest than anything she usually wore but still expensive and flattering.  She was still toned, and her ass looked good.  Pressing her hand to her stomach showed it was mostly flat and firm.  “Huh, and you’ve had a child.  Well, good for you.  Not bad for thirty-five, Lena.  I wonder how much help you’ve had.”

“I help you, Mommy.”

Smiling down, Lena said, “I’m sure you do, Aiden.”  She looked away; then her head snapped back to the boy.  “Aiden.  Your name, it’s Aiden.”

“Yes!”  Leaping at Lena, his knees tucked up so that they struck her, Aiden grabbed for Lena.

She caught him, grunting slightly as he collided with her in a way that suddenly felt all too commonplace.  “Aiden, my son, Aiden.”

“Yes, Mommy.” He smiled.

“I…” Lena shook her head, not knowing what to say but somehow knowing this person, knowing him more and feeling more for him with each passing second.  She pulled him in, holding him close in an attempt never to lose him, to never lose this feeling.  “Aiden.”

“Mommy.” He held her tight in return, choking her slightly as he wrapped his arms around her neck until he said, “Can we get breakfast?  I’m hungry.”

Lena laughed, turning him so the child was on her hip and she freed a hand to wipe tears that had begun to run down her face.  “Of course.  Let’s go feed that belly of yours, little man.”

When she poked at his stomach, Aiden squirmed and wiggled, giggling happily. 

As they headed toward the door, Aiden said, “Wait.  Wait.  You forgot your Neuron.”

“I forgot my what?”

Aiden pointed back to the bedside table.

Wandering over that way, Lena found what looked like a watch with a plain silver face and a red band.  She held it up.

Aiden nodded.

She placed Aiden on the bed and put it on, the watch screen coming to life with the face of a woman and speaking.

_“Good morning, Lena.  Happy Birthday.  Today is a vacation day.  It is 9:17 AM.  Would you like to know the temperature, your vitals, stock information, email update, and other data?”_

“Uh…no, no thank you,” Lena replied, shaking her head.

 _“Very well.  Please let me know if I can be of further assistance.  Goodbye.”_ The watch screen went blank again, the woman’s face disappearing.

When Lena looked back at Aiden again, he leaped from the bed into her arms.

They walked together down the hallway descending the stairs into the living room, an odd sense of déjà vu overcoming Lena the whole time.  The living room was spacious with sliders to the front of the house on one side and an entrance to the kitchen on the other.  Near the sliders, there was a cabinet built into a wall with a set-in TV that took much of that wall.  The carpeting was oatmeal in color and a thickness that begged you to run around barefoot.  There was a dark brown sectional couch, seating for four on one area and three on the other.  Large end tables sat at both sides, most of the lighting seeming all to be set into the ceiling.  There were two armchairs in the room, their material matching the throw pillows on the couch, and one was almost adult-sized and the other even smaller.  Right next to each of these was a small bookshelf filled with children’s books of varying ages.  The only lamps in the room sat next to each of these chairs.

“That’s your chair,” Lena said, pointing to the smaller of the chairs.

“My reading spot,” Aiden agreed.

“You love to read,” Lena said wistfully.

“Mommy, are you all right?”

She nodded.  “Still a bit sleepy, baby.”

“You need your coffee.”

Lena laughed.  “That sounds about right.  Let’s go get Mommy some coffee.  The kitchen is…that way.”  Lena pointed through an archway across from the sliders in the living room and headed that way.  She had only hit the tile floor when she stopped.

The tile in here was nearly as light as the living room carpeting, just a shade darker than the cabinets.  There was a massive center island with a butcher block top one length and tiling along the other.  Along the tiled side were high-backed stools, seating for four.  Steel, high-end appliances finished the look, though most of the refrigerator was covered with colorful pieces of paper, children’s artwork affixed with magnets.  It was something Lena had only ever seen in a magazine spread, and definitely never in a home in which she had lived…except she had.  She knew this.  This was right.  This was home. 

 It wasn’t any of that, no inanimate object that froze Lena in her tracks.  It was the back of the person who was cooking that caused her breath to catch.  Wearing pajama pants and a ribbed, gray tank top, the woman’s reddish hair hung messily at shoulder length.  As the woman shifted from side to side, Lena watched this person’s hips and tried to make sense of what she saw and felt: closeness, casualness, intimacy, desire.  Blinking rapidly as this last emotion hit, Lena was more than happy to place the squirming child on the ground.

He ran up to the stove, slamming into the legs of the person cooking.  “Mama!  Mama!  I woke her up!  Now we can have breakfast!”

“Easy fella.” The woman cooking laughed and flipped two more pancakes before turning.  “Sorry, I couldn’t keep the beasts at bay anymore.  They’re starving.  How’d you sleep, beautiful?”

“I…I…I…” Staring at a slightly older Alexandra Danvers, Lena couldn’t form a coherent sentence.

Tugging at Alex’s hand, Aiden waited until she looked down at him and said, “Mommy had a nightmare.”

“She did?”

He nodded.

“Awww.” Alex lifted the boy into her arms, carrying him over to Lena.  “You have a bad dream, Lee?  Are you okay?”

“Oh, my God.” Lena tried to calm her breathing.

“Sounds like a doozy.”  When Alex leaned in for a kiss, she only met air.  “Hey, you okay?”

“I…” Lena shook her head, pointing at her own face.

“Hey.” With a bright smile, Alex stepped in closer and wrapped an arm around Lena’s waist.  Trapping the other woman in place against her body, Alex pressed their foreheads together.  “You know, I’m not scared of your morning breath after all these years.  I love you, birthday girl.” Pressing her mouth forward, her lips captured Lena’s for several seconds.  When she pulled away, Alex mushed her lips to one side and said, “Yeah, you were right.  You could use to brush.”

Before Lena could even think how to respond, Aiden said, “Mama, that’s not very nice.”

“Well Mommy has dog breath,” Alex said, hanging her tongue out of her mouth and panting.

“Woof!” Aiden replied eagerly, hanging his tongue out of his mouth and panting along.

“Do dogs eat pancakes?” Lena asked.

“Crap, pancakes!” Alex hastily handed the child back to Lena and rushed over to give the food attention.

“Mama, that’s a bad word,” Aiden scolded.

“Yes, yes, I know.  Mama has a potty mouth.  Only your Mommy is a lady.  Lee, would you like to reprimand me also?”  Alex looked over her shoulder.

Eyes wide, Lena shook her head.

“Huh.  Okay, well, maybe later in private.”  With a wink and a grin, Alex went back to cooking.

“Oh, dear Lord.”

“Mommy, you pray a lot today.”

Nodding, Lena replied, “It’s a good day for praying.”

“Mommy.”  Grabbing a piece of folding construction paper from the table, Aiden waved it about.  “I made this for you, for your birthday.”  He smiled broadly.

“Oh, you uh…you did?”  Lena took the paper staring at the words, ‘To My Mommy.  Happy Birthday.’ That were written very neatly on the front in crayon with a picture of a birthday cake with lots of candles on it.  She smiled nervously, swallowing.  “Thank you, Aiden.  Did you get help from…um…” Lena made an awkward gesture over toward Alex. 

“No, I did them all by myself.  My teacher, Mrs. Hardgrave, she says I make the neatest letters in the whole class.”

Slowly Lena’s smile became more sincere.  “I’m sure you do.”

“Woof!  Woof!  I’m a doggy!” Aiden said, sliding out of Lena’s grip to the floor.

“You certainly are a squirmy thing.”

“Woof!  I’m a doggy.”

“Are you sure you’re not an eel?” Lena asked.  “Eels are much squirmier than dogs.”

“Woof!  I’m thirsty.  Woof!”

“Ah…right.”  Lena looked around the kitchen, seeing a glass drying in the rack by the sink as she placed the hand-made birthday card on the center island.  Grabbing the glass, she filled it with water and held it out to the boy.  “Here you are.”

“Woof!  I’m a doggy.”

“Huh.  Dogs don’t drink water?”

Looking over her shoulder, Alex said, “Lee, he wants it in a bowl on the floor.  Are you sure you’re all right today, sweetie?”

“Oh um…” Lena nodded, walking over to the cabinets until one felt right.  She opened it, finding a selection of breakfast bowls.  She dumped the water from the glass into the bowl, placing it on the floor near the center island.  “There, dog water.”

“Woof!” Aiden agreed, lapping at it messily.

“Careful,” Lena warned Alex.  “Your pet is getting water all over the floor.  Don’t slip.”

Alex laughed while plating pancakes.  “Well, we all can’t make perfect little ladies.  Mind getting me the butters and the syrup, sweetie?”

“Butter and syrup.  That I can do,” Lena replied looking twice at Alex, not sure what else to say, but happy to have the out.  She walked over to the fridge, opening it and finding the requested food easily.  It was exactly where she expected it to be.  It was exactly where she knew it would be. 

Closing the fridge, she stared at the pictures hanging there.  They were done with crayons and pencils, some colored and some good-old number two.  They ranged from children’s homework to artistry.  Lena’s favorite was a set of stick figures, two women in the middle, the spindly hands obviously grasped together.  One had black hair and the other red.  On one side was a child with black hair and on the other a smaller one with brown.  With careful strokes of her fingers, Lena ran her fingers across the images and felt even closer to home.

Her eyes caressed each image that hung on the refrigerator.  That Christmas tree was from spending last Christmas with Grandma Eliza and Grandpa Jeremiah.  An HRC equality magnet held a kids report card in place, and somehow she knew it was straight A’s without looking inside it.  The school schedule for 2028-2029 hung from the mouth of a turtle magnet.  On the bottom part of the fridge, chunky and colorful plastic letters spelled words and twisted in every which way.  On the top, small and neatly ordered black letters on white backgrounds stood closely together spelling out words like: home, family, love, science.  There was a hand turkey from Thanksgiving with only three fingers and a thumb because Aiden had used the hand of J’onn J’onnz…who was Alex’s Martian boss at the DEO.  As she circled the fridge, she found a picture on the side, a photograph of herself younger, closer to the age of which she thought…use to think…used to be…her younger age and of Alex.  They were both smiling and leaning close together, each with a tropical flower in their hair.

“Hawaii.”

“What was that, Lee?” Alex asked, flipping pancakes.

Hurriedly putting the butter and syrup on the counter, Lena yanked the photograph from the fridge magnet and all.  She turned to Alex, holding it out.  “Hawaii.  We went to Hawaii together.”

“Uh-huh,” Alex said, grabbing a dishtowel and wiping her hands while her gaze went from the picture back to Lena.

“We argued about this.  I listed a half-dozen destinations in Europe that would be better, more appropriate, but you said you were paying for the trip.  You said you always wanted to go to Hawaii, and Hawaii was in your budget.  You said you were paying for the trip if I was paying for the…paying for the…”

“Lee, honey, you’re starting to scare me.  Sweetie, what’s going on?”

“Wedding,” Lena said, slapping the picture into Alex’s chest, forcing the other woman to grab it to keep the image from falling to the ground.  “We had a wedding and went to Hawaii on our honeymoon.  We’re married.”

Head tilting to the side, a deep frown settled around Alex’s mouth as worry filled her eyes.  “Lena, we need to call someone.  Tell me what you’re feeling so I know who to call.”

Wrapping her arms around herself, Lena stepped back.  “No one.”  When Alex’s hand gripped her elbow, Lena shirked it off and stepped further away.

“Please, Lee, don’t run from me.  You know I won’t hurt you.”

“What’s wrong with Mommy?” Aiden asked from the floor.

“Nothing,” Alex assured him.  “She’s just a little…here.”  She handed him a piece of bacon from the drying plate.  “Dogs eat bacon.”

“Woof!”  He grabbed it, digging in.

“Lee I…” Alex saw Lena by the exit near the living room and hurried after her.  “Honey, wait up.  Lena, sweetie, talk to me.  Let me help you.”

“I’m fine.  I don’t need help,” Lena replied walking away.

“The hell you don’t.” Grabbing Lena’s wrist, Alex turned the other woman back to her and held her in place.  “Lee, tell me what’s wrong?”

Grabbing her hand with her other one, Lena pulled and yanked, pulling her hand free as she yelled, “Nothing!  I just have to pee!  I’m fine!  I’m completely fine!  I’m normal!  This is normal!  Stop badgering me!” Lena kept responding while she raced away and up the stairs, down the hallway, into her bedroom, and into the attached bedroom, closing and locking the door behind her.  Heart pounding, she stood leaning with her back to the door.  “The bathroom is en-suite.  Oh, God.  I knew the bathroom was en-suite.  This is my house.  This is my life.  I’m remembering this.”

Wandering over to the sink, Lena splashed some water on her face.  She patted it dry with a towel, staring at herself and feeling much more at home with the reflection than she did earlier.  Perhaps it was the running of the water, but she actually did have to use the toilet, so she did so.  Once done, she stopped by the sink again, seeing two toothbrush heads by the electric toothbrush machine.  Somehow she was certain which one was her, so she snapped it into place, brushing her mouth clean and rinsing.  Her hair was next, brushed out and put into a ponytail with one of the hair ties from the drawer on the top left side as she knew they’d be.  Staring into the face in the mirror, she now only saw herself, Lena Luthor, exactly as she expected to be.

When she exited the bathroom, Lena wasn’t surprised to see Alex waiting for her, arms crossed, leaning against the doorframe. 

“You’re not leaving this room until we talk,” Alex said.

Lena nodded.  “Where’s Aiden?”

“Lori has him.”

“Lori…my daughter Lori.”

Standing upright, Alex’s body language went rigid.  “Well, she’s my daughter too.”

“Right, but I gave birth to her.”

“Lee, are you mad at me?  Is this because of that mission last week that I…?” Running her hand through her hair, Alex slowly turned in a full circle.  “Damn it, Lee; you said we were good.  I’m sorry I didn’t tell you beforehand, but classified is classified even from your wife.”

“I have a full security clearance.”

“It was on a need to know basis, Lee.”

“I needed to know!” When Lena yelled, they both took a step back.  Shaking her head, Lena said, “I’m sorry.  You’re right.  I said that was done.  I shouldn’t have…This isn’t about that.”  Lena dropped to a seat on the bed, folding her hands in front of her and staring at them.

Alex walked up to the bed and cleared her throat, pointing next to Lena and when her wife met her gaze and asking, “May I?”

“Of course.”

Alex sat.  Carefully she reached across and slid two fingers between Lena’s clenched hands.  “Talk to me, Lee.  Don’t shut me out.”

Lena nodded.  “I had a dream.”

“Was I in it?”

“Oh, you had a starring role.  It was about the mech.”

“You dreamt about your mech?”

Lena paused trying to order her thoughts that felt so jumbled.  “It was about the day we found it, the day at the warehouse.”

“Oh, Lee.” Pulling her hand free, Alex slid that arm around Lena’s shoulders and put her other hand over both of Lena’s.  “Aiden was right.  That was a nightmare.  Are you all right?”

“Disoriented,” Lena admitted.  “Have you ever had a dream and woken up, not sure if you’re awake or still dreaming, not sure if you were dreaming before or not?”

“Sure, I guess.  Sometimes dreams are tricky.  It was pretty vivid?”

“Incredibly.  Darling, it felt like I was there.  There were sounds, smells, things I touched that were all so…you ruined my suit and those beautiful four-inch Lois Vuitton stiletto’s I was wearing.  Oh, I was so pissed at you.”

“I was pretty pissed at me too.  I never properly got to see you in those stilettos.”  Alex grinned.

“Darling, you’ve gotten to see me in other four-inch stilettos.”  Lena paused a bit uncomfortable.  “And garters…and nothing else.”

“Lee,” Alex breathed her wife’s name, leaning closer.  “Mmmm.  You know what I want to do for your birthday?”

  With a small chuckle, Lena retreated a bit. “The same thing you want to do on the other 364 days of the year?”

“What about leap year?” Alex’s mouth found Lena’s neck, nipping at the other woman’s throat.

Pushing back her wife, Lena stared for several moments but then grinned. “On that day, we rest.”

Alex pouted.  “Spoilsport.  Okay, you do seem better.  So it was just a bad dream?  Because in the kitchen you seemed really out of it.  Lee, it was like you barely even remembered our wedding.”

“Oh God no, Alex.  I remember it.  We had it up in L.A.  James was the wedding photographer, of course.  Your father walked you down the aisle.”  Lena smiled.  “It was only eight months after we ended Cadmus and got him back.  Winn walked me down the aisle and…Winn walked me down the aisle?  Does that seem odd?”

“Why should it.  You and Winn are great friends.”

Lena nodded.  “You’re right.  Winn and I are great friends.  I’m sorry, darling.  This damn dream has still got me so unsettled.”

“Do you want to talk about it more?”

Lena shrugged.  “It’s like I said; it was the day we got the mech and all of Lex’s drones.  It’s the day I didn’t…I failed to…”

“Hey, you did your best.”

“Did I?”

“Lee, where’s this coming from?  You climbed into that damn thing, not knowing if you’d live.  You sent everyone else away expecting to die and stayed to try and stop that bomb.  That was one of the fucking bravest things I’ve ever seen.  That was the moment my eyes opened up to you.  That was the moment I started to fall in love with you, even though I didn’t know it at the time.  You know that.”

“I…thank you, darling.  This dream though, I can’t shake the feeling that there was something else I could have done, but I didn’t.”

“Lee, it’s just a dream.”

“Is it?” Pulling free of Alex, Lena stood and began to walk out of the room.

“Hey, where are you going?” Alex asked hurrying after Lena.

“Nowhere, just feeling unsettled.”  Taking Alex’s hand, Lena led her down the hallway toward the stairs. “Walk with me?”

“Of course.”

“In my dream, I think there was something else in the mech.”

“Like what, some other piece of technology?”

“Like…” Lena shook her head.  “I have no idea.  I can’t remember now.”

“Dreams are like that,” Alex agreed.  “Hey, maybe you should keep a notebook next to your side of the bed.  If this happens again, write down whatever you remember when you first wake up.  How does that sound?”

“Good idea.  Right now all I know is that there was something there and I could have done more; I could have saved…”

On the way down the stairs, Alex and Lena paused, shifting to one side.  Aiden and a little girl, a few years older than Aiden, were coming up the stairs.  She was holding his hand and taking the lead while he slowly made his way up the stairs.  The girl stopped, black hair in a ponytail, Supergirl pajamas on, and she stared dead on at the two women.  She had one green eye and one brown one. 

Lifting just the eyebrow over her green eye, she said, “Your son is soaking wet.  He was drinking water out of a bowl on the floor, but he’s done now.  The floor is also soaking wet.  I’ll get him dry clothes.”

“Lori,” Lena said, blinking several times as years’ worth of information suddenly flooded her mind and emotions swept through her.

“Mother.” Lori replied as she began up the stairs again, her brother in tow.  She had only made it three steps before she stopped, turning and speaking over her shoulder, “Oh, Happy Birthday.  Maybe we could teach this one to drink out of a glass before he turns five?”

“Just go change your brother, smarty pants,” Alex said.

“Of course, Maternal Unit Number Two.” Squeezing Aiden’s hand, Lori said, “Come on Fido, let’s see if we can’t find you something dry and maybe a Milkbone.”

“Woof!”

As the children wandered up the stairs and out of sight, Alex sighed.  “I swear, Lee, she is so you.”

“I think she’s perfect,” Lena replied, a smile touching her lips.

“Oh, so does she.”

As they made their way down the stairs, Lena turned into the living room and stopped.  “So in the dream…in the dream…”

“Go ahead, sweetie.”

“I don’t know,” Lena admitted, biting at the pad of her thumb.  “I just keep feeling like I could have stopped that bomb.  I could have stopped the Kryptonite.  I could have saved those cops.”

Alex was shaking her head, trying to stop what Lena was going to say next.

“I could have saved Maggie.”

“Lee, baby, no.  You did everything, took every last second you had, and you were willing to die to try and save her.”  Grasping both of Lena’s upper arms just above the elbows, Alex pulled the other woman in closer to her.  “Baby, you tried everything.”

“But still your girlfriend died, and you married me.  How convenient was that?”

“Oh, my God, really, Lee?” Stepping away, Alex ran her hand through her hair.  She held one hand there, gesturing a bit wildly with the other hand.  “Is this some kind of mid-life crisis or something?  I remember turning thirty-five, and my birthday was just us, kids, family, and my parents taking the kids so we could go away for the weekend.  You know, normal couple stuff.”

“We’re a normal couple?”

“Uh, well…okay, that’s a fair point,” Alex admitted as her hands fell away, body language stilling.  “I’m a secret agent, and you’re the CEO of a multi-billionaire organization.  Plus with your mech and drones, you have Luthor Tech security that assists the DEO in protecting the planet from alien insurgents.  Speaking of which, I’m supposed to try and convince you to turn over the mech technology to us for—”

“Not going to happen,” Lena said, her head shaking as she crossed her arms.  “I adore you Alex, but one of those things running around is dangerous enough.  It’s proprietary equipment and licensed under L-Corp.  With the DNA encryption, it will be Lori’s one day, but I am never turning it over to the government.”

“Are you done?” Alex asked.

“Until you ask again, yes,” Lena agreed, loosening her shoulders, her arms hanging straight down again.

With a peck on her wife’s lips, Alex said, “Fine, then let’s fight about this next month.”

“Fine.  I’ll put it on my calendar.”

Alex grinned.  “Have your people call my people.  I know the answer will always be no, but I mainly ask so I can tell James I’ll ask and then tell him you said no again.  I like to get his hopes up.  He’s such a sad little tin man.  I think he’s going to cry and rust himself into place one day.”  He voice stiff and creaky, Alex barely moved her lips as she added, “Oil me.”

“James, of course, James would ask because he’s Guardian which I know.”

Alex nodded.

“And Winn built his suit for him which I also know because he works at the DEO…with you…and I have clearance to know that…because I’m a consultant there.”

“Lee, you’re scaring me again.”

“What?  Why?  I’m fine.  I’m totally fine,” Lena assured her wife.

“You know who Kara is?”

“Your sister?  Of course, I know who Kara is.  She’s my best friend.  She lives in Los Angeles, works for the L.A. Times.  She’s Supergirl.”  Eye’s widening, Lena repeated, “She’s Supergirl.”

“You seemed surprised.”

“No, I…No, I knew that.  Alex, it’s like I know all of these things, but I don’t know them until I know them, until I use the information.  Like that fight we had about your mission, as soon as you mentioned it I was so mad at you, but until you said something about it, I didn’t even know the mission existed.”

“Really?” With a sideways grin, Alex scratched at the back of her neck, further mussing her hair.  “Now I wish I hadn’t reminded you.  That was one hell of a fight.”

“I remember…now.  I won’t forget it again.”

“Fuck,” Alex mumbled under her breath.  “Sweetie, maybe we should call J’onn and M’gann to watch the kids and bring you in for some tests.  I’d like to get your blood work done, full screens, get an MRI.  I’m really worried.”

“Oh, it’s just this damn dream, Alexandra.”

“Full first name?  Well, now I think you’re mad again.”

“I’m not, darling.  I swear.  It’s like I’m caught half in between this dream and half between our lives.  I’m just…”

“Talk to me, Lee,” Alex pleaded. “What do you remember?”

“Well, in the dream—”

“No, about us.  You remember us, don’t you Lee?”

As Alex’s eyes softened again, it touched Lena’s heart in an unexpected way.  Soft was neither a word she associated with Agent Danvers nor was gentle…but they were.  Alex had a rough exterior, kept most people at a distance, but when she let you in Alexandra was a kind and loving soul who wrapped those closest to her up in emotional gauze, protecting them from the world, keeping them safe, loving them unconditionally.  That was her wife, Alexandra Luthor-Danvers.

“I remember after Kara…left.”

“Hmmm.” Alex nodded.

“I remember you showing up in my office with lunch that first day.  You were rude and intrusive.  I hadn’t seen you since…”

“Since Maggie’s funeral,” Alex finished.

“Yes.  You looked like crap, Alex.”

“I felt like crap.  I’d just lost my girlfriend and my sister in different ways.  Kara had made me promise to look in on you, take care of you, though now I know she really wanted us to take care of each other.  She knew I wouldn’t accept anyone checking up on me.  So I brought you lunch to make sure you’d eat instead of just working yourself into a guilt-induced early grave.”

“I couldn’t even look you in the eyes.  I was certain you hated me.”

“Never, Lee.”  Alex gently massaged Lena’s shoulders.  “I put you in an unfair situation.  If I hated anyone, it was myself.  You looked so broken after what happened.  I’d brought more tragedy into your life.  I understood then what Kara saw when she talked about you.  For the first time I really saw you, and I understood why Kara loved you.”

“It wasn’t just my rack?” Lena joked, but she wiped a stray tear that had escaped onto her cheek.

“Oh, I noticed that when you pulled your jacket off that day at the warehouse, right before you tossed it in my face.  Even though we might die, even though there was a crazy-ass mech and a bomb right there, suddenly there were your boobs and my brain kind of short-circuited.  You, they, interfered with my survival instinct.”

“Well, they are pretty fabulous.”

“So are you.”  Alex pulled Lena in close, holding the other woman.  “That first lunch led to so many more, to us working together, long scientific discussions, working to take down Cadmus, and before we knew it, we were having dinner and never even talking about your mother or my work.  Suddenly we were friends just spending time together.  At some point, it became more, and we didn’t notice, or at least we didn’t acknowledge it.  It snuck up on us and—”

“And that damn mission inside Cadmus!” Lena snapped, pushing Alex away and stepping back.

Wide-eyed, Alex stared at her wife.  “Lee, that was ten years ago.  You’re bringing that up now?”

Arms stiff at her side with hands balled into fists, Lena stood with her head tipped back and her eyes closed.  Still, tears spilled out of the corners of her eyes and rolled freely down her cheeks.  “I thought you were dead, Alexandra.  You lost coms.  You removed your tracker.  Everyone else came back from that mission but you.”

“Lee, I came back.”

“A day and a half later.”

“With Hank Henshaw, your mother, and my father.”  Alex stepped forward, trying to wrap her arms around her wife again.  “Hey, what’s—?”

Suddenly, Lena struck out, her fists pounding against Alex’s chest, drumming down and forcing the other woman back.  “I thought you were dead!  Do you know how that made me feel?!  Do you know how it felt to sit in that control room and wait all that time and think I’d never see you again!?  I can’t lose you!”

Staggering back with a hand on her chest, Alex stared open-mouthed.  She stood silently for several moments before only saying, “Lee?”

“I…”  Crying again, Lena turned her back to Alex.  It took several breaths before she could speak again.  When she did, she had gained a semblance of control.  “I’m sorry.  I don’t know where that came from.  That memory was so vivid, just like living it all again.  It was like a day and a half of feeling like you were dead, and I was alone, like I’d been a fool to never admit my feelings for you, and then seeing you again filthy and grinning like an idiot so damn proud of what you’d accomplished, of having brought down Cadmus and of bringing your father home.”

Tentatively, Alex reached out a hand and placed it on Lena’s shoulder. “You just hit me.”

“Hurt a lot less than when I hit the Kevlar that first time.”

“Hurt me more,” Alex grumbled, rubbing at her sore chest with her other hand.  “Lee, we don’t hit.  We use our words, not our hands.  What was that?”

“Fear, absolute, uncontrolled fear and…” Lena sighed, letting hear head fall forward.  She scrubbed at the tears on her face.

Alex stepped in closer, both of her hands gripping Lena’s shoulders and gently rubbing as her front pressed against her wife’s back.  She nuzzled the other woman’s hair, inhaling that familiar scent and finding much-needed comfort there.  “Babe, you’re the bravest person I know.  You never let fear control you.  Something going on in that giant brain of yours or is it that giant heart?”

Lena shook her head, patting one of Alex’s hands as she pulled away.  Head muddled, she walked over to another wall in the living room.  Framed pictures stood out there, some beautifully done portraits and others casual family moments.  There was Alex and Lena’s wedding, one with the whole bridal party: Alex and Lena, Eliza, Jeremiah, Winn, Kara, Jess, Susan, a woman who Lena didn’t…Sam!  Of course, her name was Sam.  That was odd to have forgotten one of her best friends for just a moment.  She was engaged to James.  There was another wedding photo of just the two of them, just Alex and Lena, both in wedding dressing and smiling as if two people had never been happier.  Lena remembered that day, and she had never been happier until…Lori.  This photo was from the hospital, Lena looking like she’d been dragged backward through the bushes by her heel, Alex curled around her like the proudest and most protective mum in the world, and that beautiful little girl lying in Lena’s arms with Alex’s hand on Lori’s torso.  Lena swallowed hard as the love rushed through her just as it had that day, unconditional love at first sight.  To the left was a similar photo but this time it was Alex who was exhausted and haggard, tears of joy on her face and Aiden in her arms.  On one side was Lena, proud and more in love with them, if that was possible, than she had been before, and on the other, a three-year-old Lori sat watching this newcomer to her life still considering what role he’d play in her environment.  Picture after picture, memories and emotions flooded Lena as her life rushed back in, the holes filled as uncertainty vanished.

Turning, tears that had filled her eyes spilling uncontrolled down her cheeks, with trembling lips Lena said, “Oh my God, Alex, I love you.”

Alex nodded.  “Babe, I love you—” She grunted slightly as Lena bolted into her, arms wrapped around in a death grip as if Alex might try and escape.  “Okay, it’s okay, baby.  I’m not going anywhere.”

Lena just nodded into her wife’s neck.  Still, it took several minutes for the usually stalwart CEO to calm from the storm of emotions that had assaulted her.  Each time Alex relaxed, tried to move her wife back enough just to get eye contact, Lena gripped Alex’s shirt tighter and dug in.  Eventually, the redhead accepted she was going to have to wait this out and just stood still.  Though Lena was more likely to meet her wife with ice than fire when upset, Alex had seen the fury on an occasion or two…or three.  As unpleasant as Lena’s rising temperament was, at least this would be short-lived by comparison.

Finally, sniffing, gasping around her words, Lena stepped back.

“Better?” Alex asked.

“I…I love you.”

“I love you too,” Alex said with a smile, wiping away her wife’s tears with a thumb.  “So now that makes you cry?”

Grabbing a tissue from where she knew it would be on the side table next to the couch, Lena wiped her nose.  “Tears of joy.”

“I’m going to remind you of that the next time I do something idiotic that causes this reaction.”

Heading into the kitchen to throw out the tissue, Lena asked, “Do you have plans for something like that in the immediate future?”

“Hey, ask J’onn or Lucy.  I’m not in charge.”

Turning, Lena glared at Alex through the opening between the kitchen and the living room, “Mrs. Luthor-Danvers, that is a load of—”

“Whoosh!” Wearing all red now, Aiden ran between his parents and through the living room.  “I’m the fastest man alive!  Whoosh!”

“Barry Allen, no running in the living room!” Lena yelled out.

“I’m not Barry Allen; I’m the Flash!  Whoosh!” Aiden yelled, still running.

“Alex?”

“I’ve got him.”  Grabbing Aiden, Alex swung him wide and dropped him onto her shoulders.  “Bad news, Flash, Mommy knows your secret identity.  I think we need to take this race into the playroom, okay?”

“We need to run!”

Looking up at him, Alex replied, “No running in the living room.”  Then she put one finger over her lips before she held her son tightly on her shoulders and raced toward the playroom.

When the telltale patter of big feet sounded, Lena yelled, “Alexandra, I can hear you!”

Wiping her hands together, Lori entered the kitchen and announced, “Well, your son is changed after rejecting almost every pair of pajamas he owns.  Can we have pancakes now?  I’m really hungry.”

“Oh, right, breakfast.  Hold on, sweetie.”  Grabbing dishtowels from the second drawer on the left, Lena threw them onto the water on the floor.  “Careful.  We didn’t get around to wiping up the floor yet.”

“What have you been doing?”

“Um…reminiscing,” Lena replied as she opened the stove where the pancakes and bacon were warming.  She pulled out the pancakes with a potholder that hung on the stove, then grabbed Lori’s favorite Supergirl plate and put three silver dollar pancakes on it before putting the rest back into the oven.  Grabbing silverware and a napkin, she gave them all to her daughter.  Lena looked around for a moment before saying, “Wait, let me get your apple butter.”

“Thanks, Mommy,” the little girl replied, carefully cutting her pancakes into strips.

“Do you want some melon?” Lena asked while peering into the fridge.

“Yum.”

“Me too,” Lena agreed, pulling both things out.  She put Lori’s apple butter into a small bowl, then slid it in front of the child for dipping.  Opening the container of melon cubes, Lena put some in each of two bowls.  “Orange or Grapefruit juice?”

“Surprise me,” Lori replied around bites of pancake.

Taking down a mug and pulling out a pod, Lena filled up the Keurig and started it brewing.  “I’ll get you some coffee,” she quipped.

Pausing in her eating, Lori watched as her mother left the bowl of melon on the kitchen island for her and then wandered off to the refrigerator again.  “That would be a surprise,” Lori admitted.  “Can I at least have decaf?  Caffeine is bad for a child’s heart.”

The orange juice container in hand, Lena smiled at her daughter as she grabbed a juice cup from a cabinet and poured a glass.  “The coffee is for me.  Here’s your juice.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”  Placing the juice on the counter, Lena called out, “Alex, Aiden, come get breakfast!”

“No one by that name in here!” Alex yelled back from the playroom. 

There was a pounding of little feet, and then Aiden appeared just short of the kitchen.  “Whoosh!  I’m The Flash, and me and Vibe are fighting bad guys!”  When his mommy had only managed to open her mouth, Aiden turned and ran back the way he’d come with a yell of, “Whoosh!”

Sighing, Lena rubbed at her face.  “You know, twenty minutes ago he jumped on top of me to drag me out of bed because he was **starving**.”

“Twenty minutes ago he was bored,” Lori said, nibbling on a piece of melon.

Wiggling one pointing finger at her daughter, Lena said, “You, my darling child, are wise beyond your years.”

“I know.”

Lena wiped up the floor, dumping the wet washcloths into the sink and then called out, “Flash, Vibe, superhero pancakes in the kitchen!”

“Yeah!”  Aiden’s feet pounded as he raced toward the kitchen.  “Whoosh!”  He turned the corner and hit the tile floor.  Seconds later, his feet skidded out from under him as his footy pajamas hit the slick flooring.  He skidded a bit and finally landed with a thud in a sitting position on his butt.

Lena gasped.  “Sweetie, are you all right?”

Aiden sat stunned for a moment before announcing, “I fell down.”

Lori snickered.

Covering her mouth to camouflage her own mirth, Lena nodded and asked, “Are you hurt, darling?”

Walking in behind Aiden, Alex picked him up.  “I’ve got you, buddy.  You’re fine, right?”

“Mama, I fell on my behind.”

“Yeah, that happens.  Even The Flash falls on his behind.  Want some pancakes?”

“Kiss it?” Aiden asked with a grin.

With an eye roll, Alex asked, “Couldn’t hit your head, huh?” She lifted him, planting a kiss on the seat of his pajamas and then quickly traveling kisses up his side until she nibbled on him, tickling him and making him squeal shrill and loud.

“Good Lord, you two,” Lena said, pulling the food out of the oven again.  “Lori, why do we have to live with these ruffians?”

“Don’t ask me,” Lori replied.  “You married one, and she brought the other one home.”

“Your child speaks,” Alex said, placing Aiden in a seat.  “Lee, get him pancakes?”

“Of course.”

“Aiden, what kind of blood do you want to drink?” Alex asked as she went to the fridge.

“Saturnian!” Adien popped up briefly in his chair before settling down again.

“It’s not alien blood, Aiden; it’s just milk with—”

“Lori,” Lena said shortly, raising one eyebrow at her daughter.

“It’s Saturnian blood,” Aiden said with assurance.

Lori looked back at her parents, verifying Lena was plating pancakes and Alex was pouring milk, and whispered, “No it isn’t.”

“Yes, it is,” Aiden whispered in return.

“No, it isn’t,” came the whispered response.

“Yes, it is.”

“No, Mama puts food dye in your—”

“It’s Saturnian blood!” Aiden shrieked.

“Hey!  Enough, both of you,” Alex said, hands on hips as she gave her child a glare that had leveled many a cadet at twenty paces.  “Today is your Mommy’s birthday.  I expect better behavior from you both because you’ve been raised better, but I definitely expect better from you today.  Now apologize.”

“Sorry, Mama,” they both muttered.

“To each other,” Alex clarified.

“Sorry, Aiden,” Lori said while Aiden was saying, “Sorry, Lori.”

“Better, now eat your food.” 

Lena brought the plate of pancakes over to Aiden, all cut up, but paused before putting them down.  “Are you going to have butter and syrup?”

He nodded.

“Take off your pajamas.”

“I’m The Flash.”

“I know, but if you don’t take off your pajamas, you’ll get them covered in syrup.  Please take then off, Aiden.”

“I’m The Flash.”

“Aiden—”

“I’m The Flash.”

With a sigh, Lena looked over her shoulder.  “Alex?”

“Got it, Lee,” Alex said kissing her wife’s cheek and putting a glass of milk, complete with one drop of red food coloring and a flexi-straw, down near their son.  “Aiden, are you wearing cool underpants today?”

He nodded.

“Are you sure?  I think they’re your white ones.”

Pushing to stand on the chair so quickly that Alex had to rush around behind him, Aiden fumbled to undo the zipper.  Alex helped him pull off the sleeves as he unveiled his underpants and sung out, “Teenage Mutant Ninja underpants!”

“Oh, those are cool, buddy.  You were right.”  She sat him back down, his pajamas dangling by his ankles.  “I’ll get your syrup.”  Moments later, she came back with melted butter and syrup, pouring them on top.

“You’re very clever, Agent Luthor-Danvers,” Lena said kissing her wife’s cheek, a plate of pancakes in each hand.

Taking a plate, Alex turned and kissed Lena on the lips.  “I’ve learned a lot of negotiation skills.  I’ve learned from some of the best in the business.  Come on.  Eat something warm while you still can.” 

When Lena grabbed her coffee cup, and Alex just stared up from the table with sad eyes, Lena gave an eye roll and then handed over the coffee before making a second one.  “Happy Birthday to me.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, Lee.  I’ll—”

“Kidding, kidding,” Lena said, urging Alex to sit back down.  “You let me sleep in.  That was the best gift you could have given me.  I think you could use the caffeine more than I could.  How early did Aiden wake you?”

“Before six,” Alex admitted, smile as she took a sip of coffee.

“On a Saturday?”  Lena shook her head.  “It’s all that alien blood he consumes.  It’s affecting his DNA.”

Sipping his milk, Aiden said, “Saturians are super strong and have psychic powers.  That means they can read your mind.”

Alex nodded, cutting up her pancakes with her fork.  “He’s right.  Good work my little scientist.”

“The actual name for “Saturians is the H’ronmeerca, and they’re cloned genetically modified descendants of Green Martian workers created for Saturn colonies.”  Blowing into his cup through his straw, Aiden giggled at the bubbles that appeared.

“Alex, what are you letting him get into at your lab?”

“Hey, you said anything he could read he was allowed to read,” Alex said with clear defensiveness.

“He can read…what was that word again?” Lena asked.

“H’ronmeerca,” Alex supplied.

“Hmmm.” Lena nodded.  “I feel like we’re missing a vowel somewhere.”

“It has plenty of vowels, Lee.” Alex took a sip of her coffee.  “It’s the placement of the vowels in the word that’s the issue.”

“Mama, can I go to the lab with you today?  I don’t have to go to school.”

“No work today.  It’s your Mommy’s birthday.  We’re all taking the day off.”

“Even Mommy?” Aiden asked, eyes wide as he looked up from his food.

“Yes, even Mommy,” Alex assured him.  “I think the President is going to declare it a national holiday.”

“Is this what you say about me when I’m not around, Alex?” Lena asked.

“I’m joking, Lee.”

“She does,” Lori said, sliding out of her seat.  “May I be excused?”

“You are a traitor,” Alex accused in a whisper to her daughter.

“Dishes in the sink, please,” Lena reminded her daughter.

Lori nodded, clearing her dishes and then heading back to Alex.  She tugged at her mama’s sleeve and then whispered, “I’m going upstairs to see if that thing is charged, okay?”

“Okay,” Alex whispered back.  “Do you need any help?”

Lori shook her head.

“Okay, let me know if you do.  I love you,” Alex said, giving her daughter a quick kiss.

“I love you too.”

“Hey, wash your face upstairs.  You have an apple butter mouth.”

“Where?  Here?” Suddenly Lori mushed her mouth against Alex’s cheek, smearing apple butter on her mama.  “Think I got it.”

“Ugh!” Alex rubbed at her cheek, grabbing her napkin to try and get it all off as she watched Lori leave the room.  “Lee, your daughter just smeared apple butter all over my face.”

“Not my daughter,” Lena said, sitting with coffee and pancakes in hand.  “My daughter is a perfect lady.”

“Sure, for you.  Around me, she acts like a kid.” Alex smirked.

“I can’t tell if you’re complaining or proud.” Lena took a sip of her coffee.

“Both.  Both things can be true.”

“Oh, my melons,” Lena said, getting back up from the table.

Glancing over at Aiden, Alex said, “Really, Lee?  We have company.”  When Lena returned looking confused, and with a bowl of honeydew in hand, Alex laughed.  “Okay, my bad.  I’m the one whose mind is in the gutter.”

“Usually,” Lena agreed.

“You seem much better.  How do you feel?”

“Fine.”  Lena smiled.  “I honestly think I just had a very bad dream and was having problems waking up from it.  It’s never happened before, but maybe it was some kind of sleepwalking thing.  I don’t know.”

“We’ll keep an eye out for it.”

“Absolutely.  That was awful.  If that happens again, we get me tested.  Right now I say it was just a bad dream.”

Alex sipped her coffee.  “Still, I’m going to check in with work, make sure we don’t have any reportings like that today or anything on file.  We live in National City.  When weird stuff happens, we should look for an odd explanation.  This isn’t some small town in Kansas.”

Quipping an eyebrow, Lena said, “Small town in Kansas?”

“Okay bad example,” Alex admitted.  “You know what I mean, though.”

“I do.  I appreciate you checking up on this.  We’ve been at the center of too many plots for us to just assume this is nothing.  Especially now with the kids, I don’t want to take anything for granted.”

“I don’t ever want to take this family for granted,” Alex agreed, kissing Lena.

“Hmmm.”  Rubbing at her wife’s face with a thumb, Lena said, “You have a sticky cheek.”

“I told you.  It was your daughter.”

“That sounds unlikely.”

“Talking about me?” Lori asked as she reentered the room.

“Tell your mother you put apple butter on my face.”

Lori looked from Alex over to Lena and held out a smallish wooden box.  “Happy Birthday.”

“Oh, thank you, darling,” Lena replied standing, taking the box, and pulling Lori into her arms, holding her close for several moments.  “You didn’t have to get me anything.”

When Lena released her, Lori said, “I made it for you.  Well, Mama and I made it together.”

“Oh, did you now.”

Lori nodded.  “We made it in her lab.”

Obviously concerned, Lena said, “Alex?”

“It’s fine sweetie.  It’s safe.  We were perfectly safe the whole time.  I promise.”

“Of course you were.  They’re just both so…” Lena waggled a finger back and forth between the children.  “…eager.”

“Oh, I know.  They like my work much better than yours.  For some reason, guns and aliens are more interesting than contracts and corporate takeovers.”

“I have labs,” Lena argued.  “I have extensive and well-equipped labs.”

“Which you’re never in,” Alex countered.

“Not…never.”

Alex tilted her head.  “Lee.”

“No, no.  I was there just last…” Brow furrowed, Lena’s eyes scanned left as she bit at her lower lip.

“Hey, how about we let Mommy open her gift?” Alex said, saving Lena from her own admittance.

Grateful for both the rescue and the gift, Lena nodded and lifted her daughter into one of the high-backed stools with only a slight strain.  “Someone’s getting bigger.”

“I want to see!  I want to see!”

“Ooof!” Alex flinched as Aiden struggled across the seating and half-crawled into her lap, catching him as he nearly fell with his pajamas around his feet still, then recoiled as she lifted him into her lap.  “Sweetie, would you get me a moist rag?  Someone’s sticky.”

Chuckling, Lena grabbed a new cloth from a drawer and came back with it damp.  “Thank you for saving the pajamas.”

Alex nodded, wiping their son clean while he didn’t seem interested in making the process easy for her.

“Now, what do we have here?” Lena said, popping open the wooden box to reveal the contents.

Inside was a disk, copper in color, less than an inch thick, and maybe three inches around.  Lena took it out exploring it with both eyes and hands.  It had some heft to it, and she moved it back and forth a bit finding nothing shifted inside.  She looked at the underside.  It seemed to be a base that extended out a bit and would allow the disk to stand upright.  From the top it was clear it had two pieces: a solid center with the letters A-Z raised around the surface with a blank area between the A and the Z, an exterior ring with an arrow on it pointed toward the blank spot.  The exterior ring fit snugly against the inner-piece and looked as if it might spin in place.

“You made this?” Lena asked, one eyebrow raised.

Lori knelt on her butt on her seat, elbows on the center-island and chin resting on her folded hands.  She bit her lower lip but didn’t answer.  Eyes sparkling, she stared at her mother expectantly.

Looking up at Alex, Lena said, “She made this in your lab?  Should I be frightened?”

“Oh, come on Lee.  It’s just my lab at the DEO where I do bio-engineering on alien species and occasionally tinker with extra-planetary technology.  What’s there to be worried about?”  Alex grinned.

Gaze going back and forth between mother and daughter, Lena said, “I’m frightened.”

“Oh Mother,” Lori said with infinite patience as she gently patted Lena’s hand.  “It’s completely safe.  We followed all of the safety protocols.  You know Mama wouldn’t let me do otherwise, and the DEO wouldn’t allow anything dangerous out among the civilian population.”

“That’s your mini-me.” Alex smirked at her wife.  “She’s right though.”

“Oh, all right.”  Lena placed the disk on the island grasping it between thumb and forefinger as she noticed just the slightest bit of give in the outer ring, confirming it did indeed turn.  “It’s not like this thing is alien technology or something.  So, how does it work?  What does it do?”  She continued to touch the disk for several moments before glancing up.  When she did so, she did a double-take at the nervous look her wife and daughter shared.  Withdrawing her hand quickly, she said, “Oh, good Lord, it’s alien tech?”

“Cool!  What does it do?  Can I play with it?” Aiden made a lunge for the object.

Alex yanked him back before he could connect.  “It’s not your present.  It’s Mommy’s, buddy.  You wait for your birthday.”

“Can I get an alien tech for my birthday, Mama?” He asked looking backward up at Alex, one hand on her cheek as brown eyes stared into brown eyes.

“Ah, sure you…” Alex hesitated, looking over at her wife who merely looked back with lips pressed together and one eyebrow raised.  Alex smiled and looked down at their son again.  “We’ll talk about it, buddy.”

“That means no,” Lori said.

“That means we’ll talk about it,” Alex said again, this time with a bit more force and directed at her daughter.  “Why don’t you just enjoy Mommy opening your gift right now.”  Alex tipped her chin back at her wife.  “Go ahead, Lee.  You’re gonna love it.”

With a sigh, Lena nodded.  “So any hints?”

“It’s what you love the most,” Lori explained, still with that glimmer in her eyes.

“Well, that’s my family, all of you.”  She grasped the outside of the disk again.  “Do I just twist it?”

“Turn it to the A,” Lori instructed, her breathing increasing with her excitement.

“A for…?” Lena waited.

“The first letter in the alphabet,” Lori deadpanned.

Alex failed to stifle her laugh, and when Lena shot her a look added, “Oh come on, Lee.  She’s so you.”

“Yes, and I appreciate it more times than others.”

With an audible click, Lena twisted the outer ring, the dial, till the arrow settled on the letter A and stuck into place.  A hum filled the air, and Lena pulled back her hands with an edge of concern.  A glow settled over the disk, and moments later it materialized into an image, three-dimensional recognizable, and about three inches side by six inches tall.  It was people, four very familiar people.  They sat together, moving slightly, happy, smiling, going through a very short set of motions that only lasted for a few seconds before the scene repeated.

Hand covering her mouth, Lena gasped as she watched the display loop through several times, never uttering another sound.

Apparently sensing the solemnness of the moment, Aiden pointed with his hand very close to his face and whispered, “I see me.”

With a gentle squeeze and a kiss on her son’s cheek, Alex replied, “You sure do, buddy.”

“Oh, my God.” Lean reached out, wrapping her arm around Lori’s shoulder while never breaking her gaze from the device.  “It’s all of us.  How did…?  What…?”  She looked over at her wife.  “Alex?”

Alex merely pointed back at Lori.

Lori smiled.  “Mama helped me with the DNA, and Uncle Winn isn’t a bad engineer.  Well, he’s not bad for someone’s who’s not a Luthor.”  Lori smirked.  “The key was the DNA Extrapolator that Mama had brought home from a mission.”

“DNA Extrapolator?” One eyebrow in the air again, Lena asked Alex, “Do I want to know?”

“It’s not dangerous.  It doesn’t make clones or anything, as you can see.” Alex gestured toward the device sitting out on the table, their little holographic family portrait going through its repetitive scene.  “It just makes a 3D rendered image.  The really neat thing is since it looks at the DNA, it literally does an age progression, and you can stop the rendering at the age you choose.”

“Mommy, I look a lot like you when I grow up.  Uncle Winn said ‘hot damn’, and then Aunt Lyra said something in a language I don’t know, and he ran out of the room.  They’re so funny.”

“A laugh a minute, kiddo.” Alex smirked, rubbing her daughter’s hair.

Instantly, Lori began to fix any loose strands.

“Accurate age progression of a child’s image?” Lena bit at the pad of her thumb.  “Alex, this has some very interesting applications within the law enforcement field.”

“Way ahead of you.”  Alex pointed as she spoke.  “We’ve already reached out to the FBI to—”

Grabbing her mama’s hand to interrupt the subject change, Lori said, “Turn the dial, Mommy.”

“There’s more?” Lena asked.

“A few,” Lori confirmed.  “There’s room for more too.  That’s up to you in case you want to add more people to it and, you know, in case there are more of us.”

“Another baby!?” Aiden jumped up, the top of his head colliding with Alex’s jaw.

“Ow!  Damn…” Alex grabbed at her face.

At the same time, Lena said, “No.  No more babies.  I think we’ve got our hands filled with you two.”

“But I want to be a big brother.”

“And I don’t want a concussion,” Alex said putting Aiden down on the stool by himself as she went to grab an icepack from the freezer.  “But we don’t always get what we want.”

“You all right?”

Alex nodded, waving off her wife’s concern as she dug through the freezer.

“Well, let’s just see who’s at B,” Lena said, turning the dial.

The dial clicked into place and settled pointing at the letter B.  The image shimmered, flickering out.  The glow was almost immediately replaced, though.  This time the image was of a single person, his smiling face showing as brown hair hung slightly over his eyes.  Though there was no sound, he seemed to giggle as his hand covered his mouth before the image started all over again.

“Me!  Me!  Me!” Aiden said, hopping up and down on his butt.

“Indeed,” Lena agreed with a broad smile, looking back at Alex.  “You got up just in time.  He’s getting bouncier.”

Alex stood with an icepack, wrapped in a towel, under her chin.  “Not quite in time.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

Alex shrugged her response to her wife.  “I’ll be fine.  I’ve gotten worse many a day at work.  The kid just hits like an Almeracian.”

“Almeracians have strength and invulnerability equal to Kryptonians,” Aiden supplied.

“Question.”  Lena raised one finger.  “How does this thing know Aiden needs a haircut?  I feel like he always needs a haircut.”

“We built a program to control those variables like age, weight, hair growth, even scars.” Lori ticked things off on her fingers.  “Don’t tell Uncle Winn I said this because it will go to his head, but he’s actually a really good programmer.  When I’m CEO of L-Corp, I’ll hire him.”

“Good to know Winn has some job options,” Lena said turning the dial again.

“He might need them if J’onn finds out he’s running a Minecraft II server on government equipment,” Alex mumbled.

Lena turned the outer ring again.  As the image on the disk shifted, the next hologram became clear.  A smile that was lovely if a touch smug, enough of the girl’s upper torso was showing to see crossed arms.  Her black hair was down and hung over her shoulders, but it was off her face with a hairband.  Though the image was small, the different colored eyes were still visible, and the eyebrow over the green one raised as the image progressed.

“That’s a good picture of you,” Lena noted.

“I know.”

“Humble, just like her mother,” Alex whispered as she leaned in close to her wife.

Lena slapped at Alex playfully, missing entirely, before she turned the dial to D.  This time when the image formed it was the dark-haired elder Luthor-Danvers.  Her pose mirrored her daughter’s down to the slowly raising eyebrow.

“Amusing.  I see what you did there,” Lena noted.  “So we’re doing this by age then?”

“Age before beauty,” Alex replied.

Lena snorted.

“Ouch.  That’s insult to injury, Lee.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, love.  Let me see.”  She moved the icepack, checking under her wife’s chin before kissing the red spot then kissing her wife’s lips.

“Gross.  You guys aren’t going to get all weird and gross, are you?” Lori asked.

Looping her arms around Lena’s waist, Alex replied, “So gross you’re spending the night over at Uncle J’onn’s and Aunt M’gann’s.”

“Yes!” Aiden cheered.

“Are our bags packed yet?” Lori asked.

“Why are our children so clingy?” Alex joked.

Chuckling, Lena handed Alex back the icepack and twisted around in Alex’s grip, turning the dial again.

The last image showed a woman with elbows bent and disappearing below view.  Her head was tipped back slightly, and she seemed to rock back and forth a bit as she stood proudly.  She nodded once, gaze level, and red hair swaying slightly with the motion.

“You couldn’t smile?”

“I smiled in the family portrait.  Anyway, this looks more like me.  It’s more…believable.”

“You’re unbelievable,” Lena countered.  “Well, this is the most amazing gift I’ve ever received outside of all of you.  You’re right.  I love it and—”

“Turn it again,” Lori said, patting her mother’s hand once more.

“Oh, there’s more?”

With that lip bite back in place, Lori raised her eyebrows.

“Color me intrigued.  Is it Aunt Kara perhaps?”  Jerking slightly, Lena turned a bit in her wife’s arms and mumbled, “Did you let her play with your sister’s DNA?”

“Just turn the dial, worry wart.  You know, I’m with them every day when they get out of school, and somehow they’ve made it to this age.  It’s almost like I know what I’m doing with our children.”

“Well, it’s **like** you know.”  Lena turned the dial again, a somewhat austere looking man in his fifties coming into view.  He had no hair, and his blue eyes were striking.  He held rather still, not doing much more than breathing and shifting slightly.  Though initially startled, Lena relaxed after just a moment.  “Oh, it’s my father.  I thought…I’d forgotten how much he and…”

“You okay?” Alex asked.

Lena smiled in a way that didn’t touch her eyes.  “I haven’t seen my father in twenty-five years.  Seeing him like this now, I suppose I hadn’t realized how much my brother had grown to look like him.”

Alex squeezed gently.  “We can add anyone you want to this, anyone who’s DNA we can get, okay?  We can make them any age you want to.”

Kissing Alex’s hand, Lena said, “Thank you.”

“Turn it again,” Alex replied, nuzzling Lena’s hair.

This time Lena didn’t ask, she just twisted to the G.  The image turned, and there she was.  Well, it looked like Lena, almost like her.  The hair was dark, the smile the same, but this image had a sense of serenity to it.  It was positioned leaning casually to one side, hair hanging over one shoulder, looking relatively relaxed.

“Age progression?” Lena asked, looking at Lori.

Her daughter only smiled back rather secretively.

Lena examined the latest image again, her brows furrowing when she noticed something she hadn’t earlier.  “Oh, it is me.  Both of the eyes are green.”

“No it’s not,” Lori said, her smile growing even broader.

Lena’s eyes moved from the image to her smiling daughter then back to the image again.  “Okay, well I’m at a loss.  There’s only the two of us.”

“Not always,” Alex said with a nudge.

“Not always?” Lena twisted around, looking at her wife’s kindly smile.

Alex nodded.

Returning to look at the image again, Lena fretted on her lip until her eyes grew wide.  “Wait.  Are you saying this is…?”

“Mamó.” Lori rubbed a finger along the edge of the disk.  “Are you surprised, Mommy?”

Lena’s whole face slackened, her mouth hanging agape.  “Where on God’s Green Earth did you find my mother’s DNA?”

As Lena turned on her, Alex stepped away and rubbed at the back of her neck.  She chuckled, admitting, “That wasn’t easy, but someone was insistent.  She said the gift for you wouldn’t be right unless we included your whole family.  Luckily, your mother, your mother Lilian, had packed many of your father’s personal belongings without going through them.  We found several letters from a Miss E. Healy, and the name listed as your mother’s on your birth certificate was Erika Healy, so we know those were from her.  We were also lucky enough that your dad was one of those guys who used a letter opened and opened letters on the side, so the envelopes were still totally sealed, the DNA intact.”

“Wait, are you saying you got DNA from my mother’s saliva on envelopes that were, what, at least thirty-years-old Alex?  Is that even…? Okay, obviously it’s possible.  This is outside my field of study and quite fascinating.  Explain this.”

“As if you could stop me.” Alex grinned.  “Look, it starts with the old ‘steam open the envelope trick’.  The goal is to extract both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA that’s been left behind.  The more…forcefully the person licked the envelope, the easier it is.  The biggest issue was getting enough nuclear DNA to create the genetic portrait for the…well, the portrait.”

“And it worked.” Leaning forward so that her face was level with the image, Lena stared at a woman she hadn’t seen since she was four-years-old.

“Honey, we have her DNA profile in the system now.  If you want, we can do an age progression to see how she’d look now if she were still with us.  We could even do a portrait with her and the kids.”

Spinning around suddenly, Lena asked, “We could do that?”

Grasping Lena by the shoulder, Alex kissed her briefly but soundly.  “Absolutely.”

“I would love that.  When can we—?”

Suddenly Alex’s watch started to play, “We Are Family” as everyone, but Alex groaned at the disco beat.

“You need to change that ringtone, Mama,” Lori complained.

“Shush, it’s Aunt Kar.  Answer.  Kitchen display,” Alex instructed.

From the ceiling, a flat-screen TV dropped down and then Kara’s face appeared.  The blonde was slumped back on a couch and wearing a blue t-shirt with v-neck.  On it were a series of diving penguins across a light background.  She was eating ice cream out of the container, and when the call answered she dropped the spoon in long enough to wave excitedly and smile.  “Hey, guys!  Good morning.”

“Hi, Aunt Kara!” Lori replied.

“Ice cream for breakfast?!” Aiden looked over at his parents.  “I want ice cream for breakfast.”

“When you’re a grown-up,” Alex replied.  “You look far too good for a weekend morning, Kara.  You always have.”

“It’s a blessing and a curse.”  Kara grinned.  “Happy birthday, Lena.  Has my sister been taking care of you?”

“I slept in.”

“Wow, that is a happy birthday for you.  What about you kids?  Are you taking care of your mommy?”

“Aunt Kara, look!” Lori picked up the hologram imager with Lena’s mother’s image on display.  “Mommy opened her gift.  We still need to get your DNA, though.”

“Uh, yeah.” Sitting up straighter, Kara set her ice cream down out of view as her gaze flicked over to her sister’s for a moment.  “We’ll just have to figure that out the next time your Mama or someone comes to visit.”

“They have your DNA on record at the DEO.” Lori shrugged.  “Can’t we just use that?”

“Uh, no they don’t.” Kara shook her head.

“Yes, they do.”

With a nervous laugh, Kara said, “No they don’t.  Why would they have my DNA on file there?  That’s just…That’s crazy talk.”

“They have it because you’re…” Turning to her left, Lori looked down at her little brother who looked up curious to see what would be said next.  Looking back at her aunt, and with one eyebrow raised, Lori said, “Because you’re Mama’s sister, right Mama?”

“Oh, Rao,” Kara said, slumping down into the couch.

With a throat clearing, Lena took the device from her daughter and placed it onto the island.  Arms crossed she whispered, “We’re talking about this later, young lady.”

Hands held palm up in front of her, Lori shrugged and whispered back.  “What?  It’s just a pair of glasses.  It’s not my fault.”

“What’s going on?” Aiden asked.

“Hey, Aunt Kara hasn’t seen your underpants.  Why don’t you show them to her,” Alex suggested as she lifted him to stand on the stool.

“Dada!”  He pointed down then turned around with his mother’s help.  “My butt in a half shell!”

Kara laughed, mood instantly picking up.  “Thank you, Aiden.  Hey, guys, did it come yet?”

“Did what come, Kar?”

“The same thing I send every year so we can blow out the candles together.”  She pushed on the face of her watch.  “It says it’s been delivered.”

Lena and Alex shook their heads at each other, and Lena said, “It must be with security at the front gate.  I can call down.”

A tone rang through the house, soft but in every room.

“Apparently that won’t be necessary,” Alex noted.  “They’ve brought it up.  I’ll go get it.”  She placed Aiden back sitting on the chair and then left the room.

“I’ll get candles,” Lena said, opening a drawer in the kitchen and pulling out a box.

“Do you have enough in there?” Kara joked.

“I’m younger than you,” Lena turned her back to the children and silently mouthed, “A lot.”

“I think I’m aging pretty well,” Kara said smirking.

“It must be your good DNA.” On the last two words she turned and glared at her daughter, her voice getting a bit louder and sharper.

Kara’s and Lori’s gaze met, both wide-eyed.

“Okay, got it,” Alex said walking in with a box that was about a foot across in both directions and a few inches deep.  “This is heavy, Kar.  It’s going to take us days to eat this.”  Alex began to pull open the box, removing the contents.

“Hold on.  Let me grab mine.”  Kara stepped out of the view of the camera.  There was an odd noise, like a rush of air, and then she was back perhaps three seconds later with a large cheesecake and candles in hand.  “I almost forgot the candles.  Had to go back for them.”

“Wondered what took you so long,” Lori deadpanned.

“Stop it,” Lena said quietly, nudging her daughter.  “Where do we keep matches, Alex?  I didn’t see them with the candles.”

“We decided they shouldn’t be in reach of young scientists and moved them into the cabinet over the refrigerator.”

“Right.  Thanks.”  Lena went to retrieve the matches, and by the time she returned, the box was open.  Inside was a chocolate swirl cheesecake, already cut into sixteen slices.  It was probably two inches thick and delicious looking.  It was pretty much identical to the one Kara had carried into her living room.  “Okay, that is huge.  Maybe we can send some of it back to your sister.”

“We’ll eat it!” The children said simultaneously.

“Hey, we found something they agree on,” Alex noted.  “Maybe we should buy cheesecake more often.”

When, everyone put their candles into place, and Alex began to light theirs, Aiden asked, “Where are your matches, Aunt Kara?”

“Oh, um…hey, what’s that behind you kids?”  When the kids turned, she quickly slid her glasses down, lit the candles with her heat vision, and slid her glasses back into place in perhaps two seconds later.  “Huh, my mistake.  It must have been a bird.”

Squinting at her aunt and the now lit candles, Lori said, “Maybe it was a—”

“Lori,” Lena warned.

For several seconds Lori was quiet and then she said, “Plane.”

Lena sighed loudly.

“Hey, let it go,” Alex said, squeezing her wife’s arm.  “It’s out there now.  We’ll deal with it.  It’s not a problem.  Just blow out your candles and enjoy the day with your family, okay?”

“Fine.”

“What are you going to wish for, Mommy?” Aiden asked.

“Patience.”

“Lee.” Alex shook her head.

“If she tells us it won’t come true,” Lori said.

“Sure it will.  Birthday wishes always come true, right Lena?”  Kara smiled, leaning closer to the candles, preparing to blow them out with Lena.

Lena smiled and nodded.  “I’m going to wish for the same thing I always wish for, my family.”  She walked over, kissing First Aiden, then Lori.  Then she and Alex kissed.  “I love you all so much.  There’s nothing else I could ever want than to have you in my life.”

In return, everyone gave her their love.

“Now hurry up and blow out your candles before you cake is nothing but wax,” Alex urged.

Taking a deep breath, Lena leaned toward the cake.  With her wish in mind, she closed her eyes and prepared to blow.

 

<><> 

 

Eyes opening, Lena found the interior of the mech to be poorly lit.  Very little daylight came in through the small viewing hatch, and the track lighting was a joke at best.  It sounded hollow, and even her small movements seemed to echo back to her too quickly in the confined space.  The air was stale smelling like plastic and metal that had been closed up for too long plus a fresh smell of electronics that she had always loved until this moment.  The disorientation was by far the worst effect.  A second earlier she’d been at home with her family enjoying her birthday celebration, and now she was suddenly back in that damn dream again.

“What the…What the fuck!?”

**“Lena Luthor.”**

Head-turning left, Lena zeroed in on the voice.  A woman, blue-skinned with glowing golden eyes, stared out of the computer screen.  Lena blinked several times as the memory began to crystallize.  In her dream, there was something else, someone else, in the mech.  This was that someone.

“Rama Kushna.”

The face on the screen bowed her head slightly.  **“It will take several minutes for you to acclimate yourself to this timeline again fully.  While you do so, you will be able to make a decision.  You are at a—”**

“Put me back.”

**“Lena Luthor, right now—”**

“You took me away from my family.  Put me back!”

**“No.”**

“Wh…What?”

**“Lena Luthor, you are at a crossroads.  That future is attainable by you should you choose to avail yourself of it.  However—”**

“Yes, that, I want it!  Put me back!”

**“However, first you must complete the challenge put before you.  You exist in this time.  You must live this life going forward and earn your way there.  The choice is yours.”**

Lena nodded emphatically.  “Anything, I’ll do anything.  I just want my family back.”

Gesturing toward her left, the goddess said, **“Simply complete the challenge and lose.”**

“Fine.  Whatever.  I’ll do whatever it takes to… What challenge?” Lena was nodding.

**“The challenge your brother set before you.  If you win you stop the bomb, the Kryptonite is dispersed, and no one in the warehouse dies.  However, if you lose the game your brother has programmed, then the bomb will kill those inside the warehouse.  Alex Danvers’ girlfriend Maggie Sawyer will die.  The Kryptonite will be dispersed through National City and other locales nearby sending Kara Danvers from the area.  Feeling alone, and on her sister’s instructions, Alex Danvers will befriend you.  You two will fall in love and marry.  You will have two children.  That will be the future if you fail to beat your brother’s game.  It’s your choice.”**

Open-mouthed, Lena stared at the face on the screen and shook her head.  “You want me to let people die?  You want me to force Alex and her sister apart?”

 **“I have no desire for any of this, Lena Luthor.  I have merely shown you the future that awaits you should you fail to defeat the challenge your brother has given you.  You have free will and may decide how to proceed.”** Again, the goddess gestured to her left.

“But…no.  But my children, Aiden and Lori, they need me.  I have a life waiting for me with Alex, with our family.” Lena smiled, sickly and sad, rather desperate.  “I need them.  How can I not choose…?”

**“You have free will.  Make your choice, Lena Luthor.”**

“What the fuck kind of choice is that!?” Lena snapped.  “Lose my wife and have my children never be born or let some people die, send my best friend away from her home, force her to lose her family again!?  Fuck!”

The goddess merely stared unfazed, unmoved.

“I…I can’t.  You can’t ask this of me.”

**“I ask nothing.  I’ve shown you your future.  That is a gift.  What you choose to do with it is up to you.  You have a choice.”**

“A gift!?” Lena’s laugh held no humor.  “This isn’t a gift; it’s fucking torture.  You call yourself a goddess, some kind of divine being, and you treat people like this?  How can you be so…so fucking…?”  Wiping at the tears from her face, it took Lena several moments to continue.  “No matter what I do, I lose.  How can I choose?”

**“If you do nothing that is a choice.”**

“And people die.” Lena nodded.  “How can I let people die?  How can I let someone Alex loves dies?  How can I hurt her like that?”

**“Then you will defeat your brother’s challenge.”**

“I…but my children.” Wrapping her arms around herself, Lena cast her eyes down.  Tears continued to run down her cheeks.  “I can remember Lori inside me, the first time I felt her move.  It was like the wing of a butterfly, such a soft little flutter rippling across my body.  Too soon she was kicking, stomping, pushing.  The less active I was, the more active she was.  At night, Alex would hold us both, a hand on my abdomen feeling our baby.”

When Lena looked up, the goddess merely watched her impassively.  The CEO wiped at her face again, pushing tears away. 

With a small smile, still sad but full of love, Lena continued speaking. “Lori’s birth was the most incredible day of my life until three years later.  I was a nervous wreck when Alex went into labor.  She said to me, ‘Lee, you can’t micromanage this.  Let the doctors do their work.’  She was right, but that didn’t make it any easier.  When that little boy was born, and they laid him on her chest, I don’t know which one of us was crying harder.  My God, they were both so beautiful, my Alex and our little…our little…”  As her brows furrowed and the smile fell completely away, Lena’s breathing became heavy and uneven.  “Why can’t I remember his name?”

**“You are beginning to acclimate to this timeline, Lena Luthor.”**

“Acclimate to…”  Eyes widening as she sucked in breath, Lena said, “I’m forgetting.”

**“There is nothing to forget.”**

“I’m forgetting my children.  I’ve forgotten my son’s name.”

**“There is nothing to forget, Lena Luthor.  Your children are not born.  You cannot forget that which does not exist.  The further forward in the timeline the concept, the sooner it will fade.  You are acclimating to this timeline.”**

“No.”  Lena lurched forward but stopped almost immediately as she was held fast by the harness.  “No, you…you stop this!  You put him back, do you hear me!?  You put him back!”

Head tilted to the side, the goddess replied, **“Lena Luthor, I have taken nothing.  You have no children.  You have no wife.  There is nothing for you to forget.  You are—”**

“No!!  I have a son.  He’s…I can’t remember, but my daughter’s name is…Oh, my God…”  Fumbling and slapping with the harness, Lena hurried to free herself.  “Fix this.  You have to fix this.”

**“Lena Luthor—”**

“Don’t you fucking ‘Lena Luthor’ me, you bitch!” Finally getting her harness open, Lena surged forward and grabbed each side of the monitor.  “I have children.  I have a son and a daughter, and I love them.  Don’t you take my family from me!  Don’t you take my family from me!”

 **“Lena Luthor.”** The goddess paused, taking a moment to watch the crying woman.  **“You should decide what choice you will make while you still have a concept of that potential future.  If you wait too long, you will only know now.”**

“What color?”

**“Please clarify your question.”**

Lena let go of the monitor with one hand to scrub tears from her face.  “His hair, his eyes, what color are they?  I know he exists.  I love him, but I can’t see him anymore.  I can see eyes, mismatched eyes, but I don’t think those are his.  They’re my daughters, aren’t they?  What did he look like?”

**“You should choose.  Soon the concept of your wife will fade also.”**

“Alex.”  Grabbing the cellphone from its holder, Lena cradled it lovingly.  “Oh, darling, look at you.  You look so young, so beautiful and so young.  Can you believe we were ever like this, love?  Can you believe we ever fought over stupid things like shoes and my last name?  Then we shared a last name, and I had a whole closet just for shoes in our home.”  Gently, Lena traced the surface of the screen with her finger.  She caressed it three times before tears began to obscure the image.  Wiping it with her shirt, she added, “I don’t know how to say goodbye to you.  I don’t know how to let you go.  How do you say goodbye to the first person you remember ever truly loving you unconditionally?”

When Lena looked up at her, the goddess replied, **“You will not have to say goodbye.  The Alex in that future will never love you because it will not come to pass unless you defeat your brother’s challenge.”**

“Oh, God.”  Hand over her mouth, Lena shook her head.  “That’s worse.”

**“You wish this pain?”**

“Oh, I’ve lived with pain.  I’ve lived my whole life with pain, but I haven’t truly known love.  Now that I have, I don’t know how to live without it?  How do you live without love?”

Golden eyes blinked several times.  **“Lena Luthor, it is time to choose.”**

Lena sighed.  “There is no choice.”

**“You wish your family.”**

Choking down more tears, the noise Lena made could hardly be called a laugh.  “Of course, I do.  I love and miss them so much.  Feeling them fade away is agony, but they deserve a mother, a wife, who wouldn’t let innocent people die for her own selfish desires.  No, the woman Alex loves is in that warehouse, and I can’t hurt Alex like that.  I don’t understand how souls or spirits or whatever work, but maybe Alex and Maggie will have children, and my children will come into the world that way.”

**“Then you choose to give up the future you have been shown.”**

With a shuddering breath, her eyes shut, Lena said, “I choose to do the right thing.”

**“Why?”**

“Because it’s the right thing!”  Eyes open, Lena stared at the face on the screen.  “If you don’t fucking understand that, I can’t explain it to you, you bitch!  You don’t do the right thing because of what you’ll get, because of what anyone will do for you.  You just do it because it’s right.  That’s how the world works, how it’s supposed to work.” Looking down at Alex’s frozen face staring back at her again, Lena blinked away tears and touched the screen once more.  “Now go.  Go and torture someone else.  I hope you’re just as miserable for the rest of your existence as I am.  You deserve it.”

**“Thank you, Lena Luthor.”**

Tears streaming down her face, Lena looked back at the phone in her hand.  “Oh, Alex, I’m so sorry.”

“Miss Luthor?  Oh, my God.  What’s wrong?” Agent Danvers said, tensing suddenly.

“Alex,” Lena whispered.  Her hand covered her mouth as she shook her head.  Leaning forward, the CEO looked through the narrow opening that served as her only window to the outside world.  The drones hovered in place again, moving slightly, and she could see birds in flight streaking across the sky again.  Even the occasional cloud drifted by slowly.  Time had started again.  Looking up at the screen, Lena was greeted not by the blue face of a goddess, but the grinning features of her madman of a brother.  “Oh, my God.  Oh, God, it’s started again.”

“Miss Luthor, talk to me.”  Agent Danvers peeked through her driver’s window briefly before lying down again.  “What’s going on?  What can I do?”

“Call me Lee.”

“What?”

“My name, call me Lee.”

“Uh…” Agent Danvers nodded.  “Okay, Lee.  What do you need?”

Eyes closed, tears ran down Lena’s face as she whispered, “My future.”

“What was that?”

“I said…fuck.”

“You can’t do it, can you?”  Alex asked.  “You can’t beat him.”

“I…Alex, I…”

“It’s all right, Miss…It’s all right, Lee.  You did your best.  That’s all anyone can do.  Don’t be scared.  I won’t leave you.  You won’t be alone, okay?”

Looking down at the gently smiling face of Alex Danvers, Lena wiped tears from her face again.  “You’re a gentle, wonderful person Alex.  You know that, don’t you?  Maggie is very lucky to have you, to have your love.”

Alex laughed a bit.  “Well, I guess I don’t have to worry about you ruining my tough guy reputation at this point.  How much time do we have left, or do I not want to ask?”

Placing the phone back in its holder, Lena began typing again as she said, “Damn, three minutes and eleven seconds.  Not much time.”

“No, it’s not,” Alex agreed, running a hand through her hair.  “So, um, what do you want to do with the last three minutes of your life?  Anything you want to get off your chest?”

Lena typed away quickly.  “Um…be happy, Alex.”

“Be happy?”

“Yes, you’re a wonderful person, so be happy.  I know your career is important to you, but so is your family.  I don’t mean just Kara.  Good Lord, Kara!”  Lena looked back at Alex, then shook her head.  “No, no time for that now.”  She went back to typing again.  “You’ve already sacrificed so much of your life for your sister.  She’s an adult now.  It’s time for you to take care of you, take care of Alex.  Settle down, get married, have some kids.”

“Well, I tried to…kids?  Um, I think I only have like two minutes left to live.  I don’t know about you, but I can’t even do the things to make kids, even if they’re not technically the things that make kids, in two minutes.  You know?”

“Oh, I know, darling.”  Lena grinned briefly at the phone.  “Neither can I in case you’re…never mind.  Got you.”  Lena’s eyes narrowed at the screen.

“Got who?  What’s going on, Miss Luthor?”

Sighing, Lena looked at the phone again.  “Alex, I’m not exactly sure how I know this, but you’re going to be a wonderful mother.  Promise me you’ll do something about that, okay?”

“But I—”

“Promise me!”

“Okay, okay.”  Alex held a hand up.  “What are you going to do to me if I don’t, right?”

“I’ll figure something out.”  With a final flurry of keystrokes, Lena moved one of her chess pieces on the screen. 

On the larger monitor, the face of Lex Luthor suddenly burst into motion again.  “Double checkmate!  Oh, Lee, you got me again!  You win!”

“Did he say you win!?”  Alex sat up and then dropped down very quickly again in her car.  “Miss, Luthor, did you just win?”

“Yes, we did, Alex.  We won.”

“We won!?”

Lena nodded.

“Hey, Lee, best two out of three?  What do you say?”

Head snapping back up, Lena stared daggers at her brother’s grinning face on the screen.

Suddenly, the image of Lex Luthor burst out laughing.  “Oh, I bet you look pissed!  Did that upset you?  Hahahahaha!  Oh, Lee, you always did need to work on your sense of humor.”  Lex wiped away one lone tear that had leaked from the corner of his eye.  “Don’t worry, old girl.  You won fair and square.  I bet it was close, though, wasn’t it?  Well, the mech and drones are yours now, and the bomb is yours to set off wherever you think is best.  Check out the specifications.  Those Kryptonians will never know what hit them.  Lee, I’m so proud of you.  You’re going to make this planet great again.”

“Lex, you poor, poor sick man.  I’m so sorry I couldn’t save you.”

“Miss Luthor, is it safe?” Agent Danvers asked.

“Alex, let me just verify that I have control of the—”

Suddenly a bright golden light flashed starting at the mech and emanating outward.  It washed over the drones, the warehouse, and the agent’s car.  The mech powered down, slumping to its haunches.  The drones hit the ground falling like so much dead weight.  Inside the car, Alex Danvers lost her connection with the woman inside the mech.  Though the agent still had a signal, trying to call went straight to voicemail.  Sliding out of the passenger’s side door, Alex headed out of the back of her vehicle and carefully made her way into the mech’s line of sight waiting for several heartbeats.  When there was no reaction, she dashed across and made it all the way to the mech.

“Miss Luthor!”  Alex ran up, one hand resting on the small glass-like opening on the mech, but not able to see inside.  She grabbed her flashlight and shone it inside, seeing the slumped and unconscious form of Lena Luthor there.  “Miss Luthor!!”

“Danvers!”

Turning, Alex saw several figures making their way toward her from the warehouse, some helping others.  “Maggie!  Are you—?”

“We need medical.  We took some hits,” she replied, her arm wrapped around her body.  “Who’s in there?”

“Lena Luthor.  She got you all out, shut these things down.  I’m calling for backup.”  Turning away from the cops, Alex called in for support which, happily, answered almost immediately.  “This is Agent Danvers.  This situation is contained, but we need medical on site.  The mech and drones are down, but I’ve got four injured cops here, and the civilian is…fuck!  I don’t know.  She’s stuck inside the mech.”  Alex shone her flashlight inside the mech again.  “I can’t even tell if she’s fucking breathing in there.  If she is, I don’t know if she’s getting air.  The thing seems to be powered down.  Bring the jaws of life, or send Supergirl if she can make it.  Just get me someone to get Miss Luthor out of here.  Just hurry.  She fucking saved us all, so hurry!” 

Disconnecting, Alex stared inside the mech for several seconds.  Suddenly, she ran back to her vehicle.  She unlocked the trunk as she went.  Running back, she tossed her med kit at Maggie’s feet and took her crowbar and tried to pry the mech open.  After several unsuccessful attempts, she tried to smash the window with it.  That failure proved it wasn’t glass.

Smashing the ground with the crowbar several times, Alex screamed.  “Fuck!” 

“Hey, chill, babe.  The thing is a fucking Luthor Corp. robot.  You’re not getting in there.”  Maggie dug through the med kit, pulling out gauze and cling.

Sitting with Maggie, Alex grabbed medical supplies.  “Let me see.  Where were you hit?”

Maggie pulled up her shirt, showing off her side.

Nodding, Alex said, “It’s a through and through, and it doesn’t seem to have hit anything vital.  That’s good.”

“Hurts like a motherfucker.”

“Of course it does.  You’ve been shot.  We’ll have to get you cleaned and stitched up later, but for now, let’s just get a field dressing on it.  Hold this in place.”  Alex put a gauze pad on the front of Maggie’s wound while putting another on the back.  She began to wind cling around the woman.  “God, I’m so worried about her.”

“Who?”

“Lee.”

“Who?” Maggie repeated.

“Lena, Lena Luthor.  She climbed into that damn mech and saved us all.  She saved thousands of people.  Damn it.  What if she doesn’t make it?”

“Babe, it’s not your fault.”

“Maggie, it is literally my fault.  I threw her on my back and carried her out of her office to save your life.  I pretty much kidnapped the girl to stop that bomb.”

Eyebrows high, Maggie asked, “Pretty much?”

Tying off the cling, Alex admitted, “Okay, so I kidnapped her with the President’s blessing.  If Lena dies, I killed her.”

“If she dies, her fucking nut job of a brother killed her, but I get it.”  She patted Alex’s hand.  “Hey, I’m good.  Ramirez took one to the leg.  Help him out?”

Alex nodded, moving onto the next cop.  She was helping the fourth when a rather shaky Supergirl landed awkwardly, stumbling and nearly falling.  “Supergirl!”  Alex jumped to her feet.

“Agent Danvers.”  Hands on her knees, Supergirl took a moment to catch her breath.  “I got here as quickly as I could.  I’m still not at my strongest.”

“It’s fine.  She’s in there.”

Nodding at the mech, Supergirl advanced on it.  “I remember this thing.  I’m glad it’s not moving.”

“Me too,” Alex admitted.  “Normal bullets hurt too.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”  Supergirl concentrated, staring at the mech.  “Oh, no.”

“What?”

“I can’t hear her breathing or her heart beating.  I don’t see her breathing and…hold on.  Please step back.”  Examining the mech again, Supergirl looked over it very briefly and then hit it in just a few spots with her heat vision.  The front fell open to reveal the limp form of Lena Luthor.

“Lena!”  Alex rushed the mech, grabbing Lena and pulling the slack body out.  She lay Lena on the ground, head over her mouth.  “She’s not breathing.”  Tilting Lena’s head back, Alex put her mouth over Lena’s and exhaled twice, making the younger woman’s chest rise.  She put her fingers to Lena’s neck.  “No pulse.”  Placing one hand on top of the other in the middle of Lena’s chest, Alex began to administer quick compression after quick compression, each just over two inches deep.  She fired them off rapidly, over 100 in the course of a minute.

Crouched next to the women, hands holding the back of her head while she rocked, Supergirl was keening slightly and occasionally saying, “Oh, Rao no.  Oh, Rao no.”  When Maggie came and put hands on her shoulders, the hero stood and wrapped her arms around the shorter woman, eager for comfort.

It was another two minutes later when the ambulances arrived.  The first paramedics hurried out, one with a defibrillator in hand.  Alex stepped back, updating them on the situation, Lena’s condition, how long she’d been doing CPR, and then stood helplessly by while they got to work.  Each time Lena’s body jumped from the shock that was administered, the onlookers jumped with it.

After the fourth shock, one of the paramedics said, “I got a pulse.”

“You got a pulse?” Alex asked.

The paramedic nodded, pulling gear from his bag.

“He’s got a pulse!” Alex announced.

“She’s okay?” Kara asked.

“Well…” Alex nodded a bit noncommittally. “They’ve got a pulse.  We don’t know how long she went without oxygen.  We’ll have to wait and see—”

“She’ll be all right,” Supergirl said, pushing the tears off of her face as she watched the paramedics place the oxygen over Lena’s face.  “I’m going with her to the hospital.”

“You need to go rest,” Alex countered walking over to her sister so they could talk quietly.  “I’m going to the hospital.  I’ll watch over her.  You need to go back to the DEO and get under a sunlamp.”

“No.  I shouldn’t have left before.  If I’d been here, she wouldn’t have been stuck in there.  This is my fault.  She’s my best friend.  I need to make sure she’s okay.  I know you don’t trust her, but—”

“You’re wrong.”

“Alex—”

“No, I mean you’re wrong about me not trusting her.”  Looking around briefly, Alex said, “Kara, you’ve been right about her.  Look, if you want to, I think you should tell her who you are.  She put her life on the line to save people she doesn’t know, or if she does, people who haven’t treated her fairly.  That girl’s a hero.  Hey, when she wakes up, and she will, you think maybe I could get a chance to apologize to her?  I kind of dragged her out of her office kicking and screaming today…and apparently broke a pretty expensive pair of shoes.”

“Oh.”  Supergirl nodded.  “She has really expensive shoes, Alex.”

“I know, right?  Who spends that much on shoes?  All of the shoes I ever owned combined; I haven’t spent that much on them.”

“Well, she is a billionaire,” Supergirl grinned.

“Yeah, well…hey, your ride is going to leave.  I need to go too.”

Supergirl turned, then hugged her sister and hurried after the ambulance.

Alex went over to the ambulance where Maggie had entered and asked, “Room for one more?”

Maggie grinned.  “Sure, pop a squat, Danvers.  SG head off with Miss Luthor?”

“Yeah.  I’m sure we’ll catch up with them at the hospital.”

“I doubt it.  I think Luthor has her own wing.  Hey, you okay?  You look kind of…weirded out.”

“It’s Lena,” Alex admitted.

“You think she won’t be all right?”

“I think she knew something bad was going to happen to her.”

“How so?” Maggie asked.

“Well, right before she beat the…crazy thing she had to do to save everyone, and I’ll tell you about it later, she got all upset.  I thought it was because she couldn’t win and we were all going to die, and I tried just to calm her down.  I didn’t want her to be hysterical.”

“Like you do.”

“Like you do,” Alex agreed.  “Anyway, she just kept typing and then she told me you were lucky to have me, and that I was wonderful.  Then she said she knew family was important to me, and that I’d be a great mother one day.  She made me promise to do something about that, about being a mom.”

“She made you promise to have kids?”

The ambulance lurched into motion, and Alex steadied herself and then shrugged.  “Yeah, pretty much.  It seemed weird, but I thought we were going to be dead in like two minutes, so I just agreed.  Now I think maybe she found something out in there, like maybe if she won she’d die anyway, and maybe she didn’t want me to feel guilty or something.  Does that make sense?”

“Maybe, I guess?  I don’t know.  I kind of feel like crap.”

“Right.”  For about a minute, Alex was quiet and then she asked, “Maggie, do you want to have kids?”

“Do we really have to do this right now, Danvers?  I’ve got a hole in my side.  The only thing I want is not to deal with another giant robot, or poison spitting alien, or anything like that for the foreseeable future.  I just want some nice, normal crime.  Is that so hard to ask for?  I’m not asking for no crime, just guys with bats and guns.  That’s all.  Can we drop any other conversation until I have only the normal number of holes in my body?”

“Right.  Sorry.” Turning to the back of the ambulance, Alex let the conversation die and just stared out the window.


	3. Back to the Future

“Ooof!” As a weight hit her chest, Lena’s eyes flew open.  One arm slapped down colliding with something soft, the other pinned under the rest of whatever had struck her.  Panicked, remembering the hand of the goddess reaching out for her, Lena scrambled backward dragging the heaviness along with her.  She felt something grip her shoulder as something else put pressure on her legs.  Just when the fear was becoming overwhelming, confusion replaced it.

“Mommy!”  The voice was young.  “Mommy, wake up, it’s breakfast time.”

The face of a boy in the six to seven range came into view as he climbed up next to Lena, placing his hands on her shoulders.  His face became so close to hers as go out of focus.  Shaggy brown hair hung over equally brown eyes.  Leaning even closer, he smiled and planted a somewhat sloppy kiss on her lips and pushed back.  His smile was one of pure adoration as he beamed down at her.

Still half-asleep, half-stuck in her dream, she shook her head.  “Oh, dear God.  What’s going on?”

“It’s your anniversary!” The child responded, his enthusiasm still unbridled.  “It’s time for pancakes!  Come on.  Come on.  Get up!”  Sliding off of Lena the bed revealed he was actually fairly slender and quite tall, wearing Superman Pajamas that gapped slightly around the midsection when he stretched.  The boy took Lena’s hand, pulling and tugging and received nods in return as she sat up, yawning and stretching, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as she looked around the room.

The bedroom was large.  The furniture here was a light oak, the walls a silvery gray.  Light streamed through the wall to ceiling sliders that opened to a balcony.  Giving into the child’s urgings, she slid her fingers across the soft duvet cover, pushing it out of the way. Lena climbed out of bed stretching one more time with several cracks of her back. 

Hand to the side of her head, she said, “Oh, I’m in National City.  This is my home, house, in National City.”  She blinked several times, looking down at the boy and giving him a gentle smile.

“Are you okay, Mommy? Did you have a nightmare?”

“Oh, I did my love.  It was a doozy, too.”

Wrapping his arms around her middle, he rested his head against her body and said, “It’s all right, Mommy.  I’ve got you.”

The gesture was sweet and comforting, and Lena reached down stroking the boy’s hair.  “Thank you, Aiden.  You are the sweetest little boy ever.  Well, not so little.  At the rate you’re growing, you’ll be taller than me soon, won’t you?”

He grinned up at her. “Do you feel better?”

“I do.  Your hugs always make me feel better.”

Instantly he jumped back, grinning madly.  “Good.  Pancake time.”

“Are these special anniversary pancakes?” Lena grinned, allowing herself to be led by the hand barely pausing when she caught sight of her reflection.  She dragged her hand through her hair and pulled down her black nightie that hung to about knee-length.  As the boy tugged again, she said, “Easy there.  Mommy’s barely awake.  Maybe you should carry me.”

“I think you’re too big,” he replied, looking at her skeptically.

“Not for much longer.  You’re growing up so fast.” She stopped, pulling her robe off the back of the door and putting it on.  “Okay, lead me to these pancakes.”

“Mommy, wait,” Aiden said.  “You forgot your Neuron.”

“My…?   Oh, right.”  Lena laughed to herself.  “This morning I feel like I’d forget all my neurons if my head weren’t attached.”

Wandering back to the bedside table, Lena found what looked like a watch with a plain silver face and a red band.  She put it on, the watch screen coming to life with the face of a woman and speaking.

_“Good morning, Lena.  Happy Anniversary.  Today is a vacation day.  It is 9:34 AM.  Would you like to know the temperature, your vitals, stock information, email update, and other data?”_

“No, thank you, not at this time,” Lena replied with a smile.

 _“Very well.  Please let me know if I can be of further assistance.  Goodbye.”_ The watch screen went blank again, the woman’s face disappearing.

Taking Aiden’s hand again, mother and child walked together down the hallway descending the stairs into the living room.  Lena was still having a hard time fully shaking herself from her dream.  The living room was spacious with sliders to the front of the house on one side and an entrance to the kitchen on the other.  Near the sliders, there was a cabinet built into a wall with a set-in TV that took much of that wall.  The carpeting was oatmeal in color and a thickness that begged you to run around barefoot.  There was a dark brown sectional couch, seating for four in one area and three on the other.  Large end tables sat at both sides, most of the lighting seeming all to be set into the ceiling.  There were two armchairs in the room, their material matching the throw pillows on the couch, and one was almost adult-sized and the other even smaller.  Right next to each of these was a small bookshelf filled with children’s books of varying ages.  The only lamps in the room sat next to each of these chairs.

“Someone’s been reading,” Lena said, pointing to the smaller of the chairs where the lit lamp sat next to the chair.

“My reading spot,” Aiden agreed.

“You do love to read,” Lena said wistfully.

“Mommy, are you all right?”

She nodded.  “Still a bit sleepy, baby.  It’s good to be home, though.”

“You need your coffee.”

Lena laughed.  “Oh, I wish.  Let’s go get Mommy some nice tea.”  Lena turned and headed through an archway across from the sliders in the living room.  She had only hit the tile floor when she stopped.

The tile in here was nearly as light as the living room carpeting, just a shade darker than the cabinets.  There was a massive center island with a butcher block top one length and tiling along the other.  Along the tiled side were high-backed stools, seating for four.  Steel, high-end appliances finished the look, though most of the refrigerator was covered with colorful pieces of paper, children’s artwork affixed with magnets.  Lena smiled at the overwhelming sense of home this one fixture in her life projected. 

 There was something else that stopped the CEO in her tracks.  It wasn’t an inanimate object, but the back of the person who was cooking that paused her right at the edge of the kitchen.  Wearing pajama pants and a pink t-shirt, the woman’s blonde hair was pulled back into a ponytail.  As the woman shifted from side to side, Lena watched this person’s stance, her broad shoulders, toned muscles, moreover the general domesticity of the scene.  An overwhelming sense of closeness, of family, washed over Lena, and she smiled at the rightness of this all, feeling instantly content.  A bit lost in the emotional stew, Lena was more than happy to place the squirming child on the ground.

He ran up to the stove, grabbing the person cooking from behind and wrapping his arms around her.  “Pancakes!  I woke Mommy up!  Now we can have breakfast!”

“Easy fella.  You’re going to hurt…someone.” The woman cooking laughed and flipped two more pancakes before turning.  “I’m sorry.  I couldn’t keep the beast at bay anymore.  Apparently, he’s starving.  How’d you sleep, beautiful?”

“It was…odd.” Meeting Kara’s smile, Lena returned one of her own.

Tugging at Kara’s hand, Aiden waited until she looked down at him and said, “Mommy had a nightmare.”

“She did?”

He nodded.

“Awww.” Effortlessly, Kara lifted the boy into her arms, carrying him over to Lena.  “You have a bad dream?  Are you okay, sweetie?”

“Honestly, I’m feeling a little bit disoriented still,” Lena replied.

“Sounds like a doozy.  You want to talk about it?”  Kara leaned in toward Lena, but the CEO pulled back suddenly.  “Hey, you okay?”

Lena shook her head, pointing at her own face.  “Someone dragged me out of bed, and I didn’t even brush.  With your…” Lena glanced briefly at Aiden before meeting Kara’s gaze again.  “…acute sense of smell, if you get within two feet of my mouth, you’ll smell it.”

“Ah, well thank you for protecting me.  I can hold this one back for a few minutes if you want to go brush.”

“You’re my favorite,” Lena said with a broad smile.

“Haven’t I always been?”

“I’m going to head upstairs.  I’ll just be a moment.” Passing by the fridge, the CEO stopped when something caught her eye.  She touched one of the photographs there, pulling it off and holding it out.  “Kara, do you remember this?”

“Hmmm?” Kara turned, a piece of bacon in one hand and Aiden held close in the other arm as she examined a group of them all bundled up in clothes, though Kara wore far less than the rest, and surrounded by snow and several snowmen.  “Oh, sure.  That was my parents’ house last Christmas, right?  By Rao, I love the holidays there.  The food is sooooo good.”

“Is that how you judge family time, by the food?”

“Well, by the people too.  I mean, if there weren’t so many people there,” Slowly, a mischievous smile grew on Kara’s face, “there would be more food for me to eat.”

“Ugh.  Why are you my favorite again?”

 “Because I’m cooking for you?”

“Are you burning the food?”

“Aaah!” Kara spun, flipping pancakes again.

“Hero of National City indeed,” Lena mumbled as she made her way out of the room and up the stairs.

Lena used the restroom, doing her normal morning routine and feeling much more like herself by the time she came downstairs.  She stopped in the living room, examining the wall of photos.  All were well framed, though some were professionally done portraits and others casually snapped by family members.  She smiled seeing her wedding photo, the entire Danvers clan on one side, mother and father of the bride, her wife and her wife’s sister who was the maid of honor.  On Lena’s side there was Winn, who had quickly become one of her best friends and had walked her down the aisle, and Jess who was her maid of honor.

There were photos of the children, from ultrasound, birth, pictures of them with friends and family, and at their school.  She smiled at one of Kara standing with a child on either arm, Kara flexing and holding her hands on the children’s waist to keep them in place.  There were six more identical photos in the same pose each a year apart.  At first, it had been explainable, but now it was just getting ridiculous.  They’d made a joke out of it to anyone who wasn’t in the know, saying it was trick photography.  Lena thought it was unwise to keep doing the photos, but it was a family tradition now, and she was outvoted. 

There was another photo of Alex and the children all with goggles, all smiling ear-to-ear and peering at something smoking and bubbling in a beaker.  When Lena had asked what the contents of the beaker were, she’d been told, ‘Not dangerous.’ and ‘We followed all the safety protocols.’  It didn’t fill her with confidence.  Of course, Lena knew Alex would never let anything happen to the children.  She just couldn’t help but be a nervous mother.

“Feel better?” Kara asked, coming up behind Lena and wrapping the woman in an embrace from behind.

“More human.”

“What’s that feel like?” Kara joked.

“Kara,” Lena rolled her eyes.  “We don’t even try anymore, do we?”

Squeezing Lena a bit, Kara said, “I talked to Alex a bit.  She agreed we should just tell Aiden.  I mean, he knows, right?”

“Kara…” Lena sighed.

“Hey, you know what I think he could use?”

“Don’t say a dog.”

“Well, I was going to say a little brother or sister, but since you brought up a dog, I think that’s a great idea too.  What kind of dog are you thinking about?”

Turning, Lena crossed her arms and took a step back.  “He’s not getting a dog.”

“Oh, come on, Lena.  Every kid needs a dog.  Dogs are great.  They have the biggest sweetest eyes, the softest floppiest ears, and their bellies, oh, their bellies are the best bellies in the world.  You just want to rub them, and kiss them, and snuggle them forever.”

“Kara, there will be no dog in this house ever, period, end of story.”  Lena waited, but when Kara didn’t respond she asked, “Are we done?”

“For right now, yes.  This afternoon, I’ll begin my well thought out argument again with emoticons.  Tonight, I’ll send you pictures.”

Lena sighed, patting Kara’s arm.  “Of course you will.”

Smiling and hugging the other woman again, Kara asked, “You feeling okay?  Aiden mentioned a nightmare, and you said it was pretty bad.”

Lena sighed.  “It was about the mech.”

“You had a nightmare about your mech?  I thought that thing only gave me nightmares.”

“Specifically about the day we found it.”

“Oh, that was an awful day.  I was completely useless, and then Alex sent me away and…I thought we lost you, Lena.”

“Nearly.  In the dream though, something was in the mech with me.”

“Like another person?”

“No like…”  Lena shook her head.  “I’m not even certain.  It was just a dream and this odd feeling that I could have done things differently.  It was fairly awful being stuck in there again and having Lex’s recording talking to me.”

“Was that the worst part?”

Lena smirked.  “Well, it could have been my mother.

Kara laughed. “Okay, that’s true.  So, what are you doing in here?  Is it time to move the pictures around again?”

With a grin, Lena pointed at the wedding photo.  “Oh, I’m just looking at the last picture of you as a free woman.”

Kara groaned.  “Sure, pre-wedding photo.  That joke is getting really old you know.  I’m still free.  I’m quite happy, so drop it.”

“Sure, I’ll drop it, and all accompanying stories, when you drop the whole dog thing.”

Kara winced.  “So, it’s war is it?”

Lena turned, taking a step back out of Kara’s grip.  “A Luthor and a Super at war?  Perhaps a bit passé, but who doesn’t adore a classic.  It’s a tale as old as time after all.”

“A tale as old as time?” Kara tilted her head to the side.  “Are you Beauty or The Beast in this scenario?”

“Good Lord.  Is everything a musical with you?”  Lena crossed her arms again.  “You’re the one who wants to bring a beast into my house.”

“It’s just your house?”

“It’s a premarital asset.” Lena shrugged.

“Whoa.”

Turning her head to the left, Lena looked around for a moment.  “Where’s my daughter?”

“Your daughter?  Oh, is she a premarital asset too?”

Lena lifted one brow and took two strides toward Kara.  “You’re hiding something.”  Poking Kara between the eyes, Lena said, “Crinkle.”

“Oh…darn it,” Kara said, covering the spot between her eyes.  Sniffing the air, she suddenly dashed into the kitchen saying, “Pancakes!”

Lena laughed, following after Kara.  “How many of those have your burned?”

“Not many, really.  I’m getting really good at smelling the smell right before food burns.  It helps.  However, if I did burn food and you had a dog—”

“No.”

“A dog!?” Aiden ran in from the other room.

“No!” Lena repeated with more force.  “No dog.  Dogs are not allowed in this house.  They shed, eat furniture, scratch up flooring and doors, roll around in excrement—”

“Well, now you’re being ridiculous,” Kara said, turning after she flipped her pancakes.

“Is excrement poop?” Aiden asked.

“Yes,” Lena replied, nodding emphatically.

“Dogs do that?” Aiden asked.

“No…well, not most dogs,” Kara hesitated.  “If you train a dog right, keep your yard clean, and keep him on a leash outside, it won’t be a problem.  Dogs need lots of love.  Hey, are you planning on wearing Superman Pajamas all day?”

“Superman is the best!”

Kara laughed.  “He’s okay.  We live in National City though.  What about Supergirl?”

He shrugged.  “She’s okay.”

“Just…Just okay?” Kara stammered out.

“Yeah, I mean, Superman was practically born here, and he’s older and stuff.  He’s way better.”

“I…but…pfft.  No!  He is not!  He…”  Kara adjusted her glasses.  “Let’s get you changed for the day.” She practically tossed Aiden in the air as she marched out of the kitchen with him.

Lena smirked as she watched them go, but the smile fell off her face, and she choked on air as he winked at her right before they disappeared around the corner.  Hurrying after them, Lena called out.  “Um…Where’s Lori?”

“With Alex,” Kara replied.

Leaning out of the kitchen archway, Lena asked, “What are they doing?”

Heading up the stairs, Kara said, “It’s your anniversary.  Don’t ask so many questions.  Hint. Hint.”

Lena watched her too knowing son disappear and let it drop.  She tended to the food until a child, dressed for the day, came running down the stairs and past the kitchen.

“Aiden, no running in the living room!”  Lena called out.  A second later, another figure ran past the same opening.  “Kara, no running in the living room!” 

When things got quiet in the other room, too quiet, Lena walked into the living room to see what was going on.  She knew her family well enough to know that noise wasn’t the problem; silence was.  In the living room, Kara stood on the back of the couch walking along it, with her arm raised above her head.  Lying on top of Kara’s hand with his arms outstretched, Aiden balanced.  Though Kara’s feet touched the back of the couch, it was clear her weight wasn’t actually on it.  She was only keeping up appearances.

“Are you kidding me!?” Lena snapped.

Spinning and dropping Aiden into her arms, Kara stared at Lena.  “Uh…”  Effortlessly, she slid to the floor, one hand on the back of the couch as if she needed it for balance.  “…sorry.”

Lena didn’t utter a word; she just pointed toward the playroom.

Kara nodded, putting Aiden on the floor.  “Come on, buddy.  Let’s go.”  She patted him on the head and sent him scampering into the other room, turning to speak to Lena before she left the room.  “You know I wouldn’t have dropped him.”

“That’s not the point, Kara.  There are rules in this home. We can’t ignore the rules just because they suit us.  You can’t ignore the rules just because you think you’re special.  You aren’t always here.  Rules keep the children safe.”

“I know.  I just…”  Kara nodded, mumbling as she walked away.  “I hate to disappoint you.”

Sighing, Lena said, “Kara?” As the blonde turned with her classic kicked puppy dog look, Lena added, “I’m not disappointed in you.  You’re a wonderful person.  You keep everyone safe all the time, literally everyone.  I know you would never do anything that would let the children be hurt.  Just for my sake, please, better habits around them?  Keep them on the floor and eat the occasional vegetable in their presence.”  Lena smiled gently.

With a growing smile in return, Kara said, “Okay, just not kale.  I draw the line at kale.”

“Kale is good.  You know one day—”

“Never!” Kara said as she ran out of the room into the playroom.

Chuckling, Lena headed back into the kitchen cursing under her breath as she rushed to the stove.  “Now I’m burning pancakes.”  She finished making breakfast and was sipping a cup of herbal tea when she called out, “Kara, Aiden, come get breakfast!”

“Finally!”  Aiden’s feet pounded as he raced toward the kitchen.  He turned the corner and hit the tile floor.  His sock covered feet skidded out from under him on the tile, and he pitched frighteningly to one side.  Suddenly Kara was there, catching him with ease and setting him upright again. 

“That was a close one.  Guess your mommy knows what she says when she says not to run in here.  Good thing I’m fast.”  Kara winked up at Lena. 

“Yeah, almost as fast as Supergirl,” Aiden said as he hopped into one of the high-backed stools.

“Oh, for fu…” Lena turned her back on her son, leaning her forearm’s on the counter.  “I surrender.”

A hand rubbing a gentle circle on Lena’s back, Kara asked, “Are you upset?  You’ve seemed really tense the last few weeks, Lena.  What’s going on?  Is it this?”

“This?” Lena looked over at Aiden who was digging into his plate of food.  She grinned, shaking her head as she turned back again.  “No, this is perfect as usual.  It’s something else.”

“Care to fill me in?”

“I’d love to.  I just need to speak with your sister about it first.”

“Well, that sound cryptic.  Should I be concerned?”

Squeezing Kara’s hand where it now rested on her shoulder, Lena turned and kissed it briefly.  “Absolutely not.  There’s nothing wrong.  It’s just not the sort of thing I can talk to you about alone.”

“And now I’m worried again.”

“Worried enough not to eat your pancakes?”  Lena asked pointing over to a platter of food on the table.

“Well, sure I—” Kara’s stomach growled loudly betraying her truth.  She poked herself in the abdomen.  “Traitor. I really am worried, but I’m hungry too.  Both of those things can be true.”

Lena laughed, hugging the blonde.  “With you, they absolutely can be.  Just go eat.  Everything is fine.  I wouldn’t lie to you.”

Kara grumbled and looked at Lena out of the side of her eye as she slid into a chair and began eating.  As Lena slid into the seat next to her, Kara shoved food into her mouth but kept turning her head to look at the CEO.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Kara said, sipping her coffee.  “Just…you know.”

“Kara, I promise you that—”

The blonde held up a hand.  “Alex’s SUV just rolled into the driveway.”

Nodding, Lena got up and started a new cup of coffee.

“How do you know she didn’t get one while she was out?” Kara asked.

“Because your sister is kind and courteous.  She would have messaged to find out if we wanted anything.”

“Oh, she’s the good sister, huh?” Kara asked.

Lena smirked.  “You said it, not me.”

“You hear that Aiden?” Kara elbowed him gently.  “I’m the lousy sister.”

Taking a bite of his bacon, Aiden said, “I think you’re acceptable.  You make good bacon.”

While Kara sat with her mouth open, Lena cracked up laughing.

Staring down at Aiden, Kara asked, “Are you a premarital asset?”

“A what?”  The little boy asked.  “I don’t know what that is.  Mommy, am I a premarital asset?”

“Stop,” Lena said, still laughing. “Please, stop.”

Aiden looked from one laughing grown up to the other.  “You two are weird.”  Then he put more pancakes in his mouth.

“Uh-oh.  I thought disapproving was Lori’s thing.  Aiden, you’re supposed to adore us still.  What’s going on, buddy?”

“I think he’s growing up fast,” Lena supplied.

“No,” Kara said grabbing the boy and holding him close.  “I’ll just have to squeeze you so you can’t grow anymore.”

“Let go.”

“No.  I’ll just hold you and…tickle you!”

As Kara tickled his sides, Aiden squirmed and squealed.  His limbs flailed about as he struggled futilely in the blonde’s grip.  When she puffled his neck, the sounds he made took on a whole new pitch.

Recoiling against the sound, Lena held up a hand.  “All right, enough you two.  It’s food time, not play time.  Sit down and eat.  You can play after you finish, all right?”

“All right, Mommy,” Aiden said panting as Kara let him go.

“All tight…Mommy,” Kara echoed with a smirk, shoving pancakes into her mouth.

Pointing first at both her eyes and then at Kara with two fingers, Lena glared in warning.

“Hey,” Kara got up, walking over to Lena and holding out her arms.  “I’m sorry.  You’re not in a playful mood today, are you?”

“It’s not you, Kara,” Lena replied as she leaned into the other woman and allowed herself to be hugged.

“Okay.  Whatever it is, I’ll be ready to listen when you’re ready to talk to me about it.  I love you.”

Wrapping her arms around the blonde, Lena smiled.  “I love you too.  As soon as I can, you’ll be one of the first people I tell.  I promise.” After a few moments of just holding each other, Lena added, “I’m really glad you’re here today.”

Before Kara could reply, the kitchen door from the garage opened, and people walked in.  Kara smiled broadly, turning so that she was only holding Lena in one arm.  “Hey, beautiful.”

“Hi gorgeous,” Alex replied as she walked in through the garage doorway into the kitchen.

“Ugh, not you,” Kara said with an eye roll as she waved her sister off and stepped away from Lena.

Hands on hips, Alex rocked back and forth while she smiled smugly.  “That’s not a very nice way to speak to your sister.”

“It really isn’t,” Lucy said as she walked past the taller redhead and kissed Kara firmly on the lips.  “Hi, yourself beautiful.  Mmmm, you taste like maple syrup.”

Kara held Lucy and smiled.  “I made pancakes and bacon.”

“No part of that sentence surprises me,” Lucy replied.

Bringing up the rear, Lori appeared with a smallish wooden box in her hand and behind her, a white dog, in that awkward stage between puppy and dog, skittered into the room.  Its toenails clicked loudly as soon as they struck the tile floor of the kitchen.

Lena’s inhaled breath was a hiss.  “Alexandra, what did you do!?”

“What?  I don’t know.  What did I do?” Alex stood bolt upright turning every which way, completely clueless but suddenly alert for a sign of danger.

“You brought a dog into my house.” Lena’s arm was ramrod straight as she pointed.

“Your house?” Alex asked.

Whispering in Lucy’s ear, Kara whispered, “Premarital asset.”

“Ah.” Lucy nodded.  She whispered back, “Trouble in paradise?”

Kara shook her head.  “Nah, just a sore spot I think.”

“Cool.” Lucy picked up a piece of bacon from Kara’s plate which immediately vanished from her hand.  “Really, Kara?  I can’t have one piece?”

“There’s more warming in the oven.”

Arms crossed, Lena who had been staring at Alex finally said, “Alex, we’ve discussed this.”

“We did, and I didn’t get a dog.  Plus, this is Krypto.  Krypto is different.”

“Oh, how so?” Lena asked, one eyebrow raised.

“Krypto is…” Alex looked from Lori to Aiden, then back to Lena.  “…different.”

Lena smirked, the smallest of laughs escaping.  “Well, with that well-reasoned argument, how can I possibly refute your logic?”

“Oh come on, sweetie,” Alex said.  “Krypto is different because he’s…he’s…”

“He’s Aunt Kara’s dog,” Aiden said while he chewed on his pancakes.  “That makes him special, right?”

All of the grownups looked at each other awkwardly, and then finally Alex and Lena looked over at Lori.

Shrugging, Lori said, “Well, I didn’t tell him.  It’s not like anyone told me either.  It’s just…oh, come on people.  We’re kids.  We’re not stupid.”  Gesturing her parents closer, she whispered, “I’m pretty sure he knows about Santa Claus too.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Alex said shaking her head quickly.  She looked over at Aiden who kept eating while watching them with mild curiosity.  Turning back to her wife, she said, “Lee?”

Narrowing her eyes at her daughter, Lena said, “Lori, those who believe continue to receive.  Any questions?”

“Ah.” Holding out the box in her hand, Lori said, “Happy Anniversary.”

Looking at a very familiar wooden box, Lena opened it to see a disk, copper in color, less than an inch thick, and maybe three inches around.  It was made of two pieces: a solid center with the letters A-Z raised around the surface with a blank area between the A and the Z, an exterior ring with an arrow on it pointed toward the blank spot.  The exterior ring fit snugly against the inner-piece and looked as if it might spin in place.

Eyebrow raised, Lena looked at her daughter and said, “Not that I want for anything in life, and we certainly don’t need anything else, but didn’t you give me this for my thirty-fifth birthday?  What am I missing here?”

The eleven-year-old grinned at her mother.  “It has an upgrade.  Aiden and I were talking about what to get you and Mama.  As you’ve said, we don’t really want for anything.  Well, one something I guess.  Anyway, we talked about it and thought this would be the perfect gift.”

Eyes narrowed, Lena looked at her wife.  “Alex?”

Alex shrugged.  “Honestly, I’m clueless, sweetie.  She said she needed to go to the lab and have access to the systems.  Beyond that, I don’t really know what she did.”

One eyebrow quipped up with a touch of accusation, Lena asked, “Did you leave her alone in the lab?”

“Lee.” Alex smiled charmingly.  “She knows lab protocol as well as any lab tech there.  It’s perfectly safe.  Don’t you trust me?”

“After all of thirteen years of marriage, you can honestly ask me that?” Lena replied.

“That’s a no,” Aiden said as he shoved more pancakes into his mouth.

“Wow,” Lori whispered not quite quietly enough not to be heard. “Mommy, put it down and set it to I.”

“I?”  Lena asked, her eyes shifting to Alex again.  “The last one is H, my birth mother and the children.”

Alex shrugged.  “Still clueless.”

“Everyone gather around,” Lori said as she took a seat at the counter.  “Mommy, wait until everyone is in place.”

“Is this why you’re here?” Kara asked Lucy, her arm wrapped around the smaller woman.

Lucy nodded as they moved up to the counter together.  “The future CEO of L-Corp didn’t give me an option.  She knocked on my door and told me I was required at the Luthor-Danvers household today for some critical results.  She told me my participation was not up for discussion.”

“Wait.”  Kara shook her head.  “An eleven-year-old ordered the director of the DEO to come to her house for her parent’s anniversary?”

Lucy shrugged.  “You know, I didn’t even question it.  I just went with it.  Knowing her parents, I figured I’d end up here anyway.  Showing up just seemed like the path of least resistance so…” Lucy looked up to see Lori staring at her.

“Are we done chatting so my parents can look at their anniversary gift?” Lori asked.

Leaning into Kara, Lucy whispered, “That kid scares me.”

“Me too,” Kara whispered back.  “And she’s my niece, and I’m invulnerable.”

Lori cleared her throat.  “Mommy, Mama, Aiden and I wanted to do something special for your anniversary.  So, two days ago, Aiden distracted Mama at the lab, and I broke into her system and—”

“He what!?  You what!?”  Alex scrubbed at her face with her hands.  “Oh, my God.  What is wrong with you kids?  Do you know how many federal laws you broke?  Do you know what you…?  My boss is right here!”  Alex pointed over at Lucy.

“Mama.  Mama, it’s fine,” Aiden sat patting his mother’s arm reassuringly.

“It is not fine, Aiden.  It’s illegal.  It’s…” Alex sighed loudly.  “Just tell us what you did.  Tell us you stayed out of restricted areas.  Please, God, please tell us you didn’t get into anything classified.”

“Mama.” Lori smiled, her resemblance to Lena eerie in this moment.  “We didn’t touch anything that was classified by the government.  We stayed out of all DEO agent and agency files.  We just accessed one of Mommy’s records.”

Lena’s face switched from alarm to confusion.  “My records?  Why in the world would you need my records?  What were you little imps up to?”

Lori looked over at Aiden, and they both smiled.  Looking back at her Mommy she nodded and said, “Turn the dial to I and you’ll see.”

“I’m not fond of surprises you know,” Lena muttered.

“Exactly!” Aiden said, popping up in his chair.

“Shhhh!” Lori waved her hand at him.  “Let her do it.  Don’t ruin it.”

“I kept the secret.  I’m a good secret keeper.”  Looking over at his Aunt Kara, he winked rather obviously.

As Kara moaned, Lucy squeezed her side and asked, “Something we should talk about?”

Kara nodded.  “After whatever this is, I think so, yes.”

“Turn it to I, Mommy.  Okay?” Lori urged again.

“Fine.  I trust you,” Lena replied, kissing Lori on the temple.

Taking the disk out of the box, Lena placed it on the table.  She grasped the outer ring and twisted it through several letters, making it click each time until it landed on I.  There was a noticeable hum in the air from the energy.  A second or two later, a glow settled over the disk.  It shifted and changed from just a shifting energy into an image, the smiling face of a child perhaps three years old.  She had black hair that hung to about her shoulders, chubby cheeks, a dimple, and light eyes.  She moved very little, just a smile forming and making that dimple grow before the scene repeated.  

The family studied the scene for several moments before Alex said, “I don’t remember Lori having a dimple when she was younger.  Does she have a dimple?”

“Oh, man, it—”

“They’ll work it out,” Lori said, cutting off her brother who was pouting a bit.  “Let them work it out.”

“Lori did not have a dimple,” Lena said turning he image a bit.  “She also does not have blue eyes.  Who is this?  Why does…?”  The CEO gasped, spinning toward her daughter and grabbing the eleven-year-old by the shoulders.  “Did you break into my medical records?”

Lori smiled.  “I knew you’d figure it out.”

“Oh, my God,” Lena said.  “Oh, my God.  Oh, my God!”  Letting go of Lori, she threw herself into Alex’s arms.  “Oh, My God!”

“Lee?”  Alex held her wife close and whispered.  “Honey, did she—?”

“Yes, the cells from the amniocentesis, she took them and she…” Lena ducked her head, wiping at her tears.  “A girl.”

“Amniocentesis?” Kara stood up straight, her eyes wide as she looked from one member of the Luthor-Danvers family to another.  “Did Lena say amniocentesis?”

“Wait a minute,” Lucy said.  “Lena, are you pregnant?”

Turning her head but with her wife still held tight against her chest, Alex smiled ignoring the tears that streamed freely down her cheeks.  “We’re pregnant.  I guess we’re having a little girl.”

“I’m gonna be an aunt…again!” Kara said throwing her arms above her head.

“Argh!” Aiden moaned loudly.  “Not another girl.  I’m surrounded by women.  Mama, can you get pregnant and give me a little brother?  Mommy only makes girls.”

Alex chuckled.  “That’s not how it works, buddy.  Even if I were to have another baby, there’s no guarantee it would be a boy.  It’s like your kindergarten teacher told you about lollipops.  You get what you get, and you don’t get upset.”

“Well, you could adopt,” Lori said causing silence to fall over the room.  As everyone stared at her, she nodded.  “I’ve heard you talking about it, and you have the Luthor-Danvers Children’s Foundation.  You help children find other families.  Why not us?”

“Yeah, why not us?” Aiden echoed before either of his parents could say anything.

“Lee?” Alex looked at her wife.

“Kids, there’s a lot to consider,” Lena began.

“You were adopted,” Aiden said.

“I…was,” Lena agreed, not going down that rabbit hole.

“Aunt Kara was fostered, and Grandma Eliza and Grandpa Jeremiah are the same as parents to her right, Aunt Kara?” Lori asked.

When everyone looked at her, Kara smiled, “Well, they are.  They’re amazing.  I lucked out.”

“See, Mommy,” Lori said.  “See how happy Aunt Kara is.  We could do this.”

Alex held up her hands.  “Okay, guys.  Let’s table this discussion for later.  No one is saying no.  Your mommy and I have talked about this more than once, but maybe the four of us should sit down and all talk about it when we’re feeling a bit less emotional about baby stuff.  How does that sound?”

“Thank you,” Lena said.

 Suddenly, Alex’s watch started to play, “Little Me” and the redhead smiled saying, “Hey, Maggie’s calling.  Should we tell her the good news?”

“Put her on the screen,” Lena said.

Alex clicked on her watch, and from the ceiling, a flat-screen TV dropped down and then Maggie’s face appeared.  Tan and smiling, she was leaning back on her couch wearing a pair of Pajama pants and a dark-gray tank top.  Her head tilted to the side as she clearly saw the family on the other side, and deep dimples appeared. “Hey, looks like the gangs all here.  Happy Anniversary, Mrs. and Mrs. Luthor-Danvers.”

Still hugging, Lena and Alex both said, “Thank you.”

“Hey, kids, Kara, Lucy, you guys having a party?” Maggie asked.

“Uh, sort of,” Kara replied, turning back to others.

Taking the disk from table and holding it up to the screen for examination, Lori smiled brightly and said, “Look.”

Maggie leaned forward, squinting.  “Okay, it’s one of your holograms you little genius.  Is that you when you were younger?  It’s kind of hard to see from here.”

“It’s not me.”

“Someone fill me in,” Maggie said.

“Why don’t you detect it,” Alex replied.

Sitting back on the couch again, Maggie studied the family, her eyes going to the hologram again before returning to the couple as she smiled and asked, “Who’s pregnant?”

“Oh, she’s good,” Lena said.

“Hey, you don’t just trip into captain,” Maggie replied.  “Congratulation, by the way.  Is it Lena?”

“Oh, she’s very good, and yes, thank you, Maggie.  I’m not very far along, so we’re not telling people yet.”

A hand held up; Maggie said, “You got it.  Mums the word.  My lips are sealed.”

“Well, you can tell Kate.  She can tell Kate, right?” Kara asked.

“She can tell Kate,” Alex agreed.  “How is she doing?”

“Sleeping.  She had a late night as usual,” Maggie replied.  “You know how Gotham is.  Crime doesn’t sleep, and it seems like she rarely does either.”

“Well, if you two ever want a little vacation, our offer still stands.  Come down here and spend a few days.  We have plenty of room.”

“You seem to forget I lived in National City for years.  There’s nothing about that place that’s a vacation.  If Kate and I headed down there, it would be the same thing with different scenery…well, more aliens.  I’ve had my fill of aliens.”  Shrugging, she smiled at Kara.  “I mean I’ve had my fill of almost being killed because of aliens.  I have nothing against any of them personally, obviously.”

Arms crossed, Kara said, “Actually, with the DEO, Lena’s mech, and Supergirl all working together, it’s safer here than it is in Gotham.  You’re missing out on a prime vacation spot, Maggie.”

“Oh really.”  Maggie laughed.  “Property value is on the rise, huh?”

“You think the Luthor-Danvers family would have it any other way?” Alex asked.

“Hey, maybe we should buy before values go up any further,” Lucy said.

“You want to buy a place?” Kara asked, looking down at Lucy.

“You want to rent forever?” Lucy replied.  “I’m not going anywhere.  Are you going anywhere?”

When the doorbell rang, Lena said, “I’ll get it.” 

At the front door was a woman in a blue and purple uniform.  Her hat was purple and had a gold band on it.  She had black hair that hung to around shoulder length and smiled brightly.  An envelope in her hand she said, “I have a letter for a Mrs. Lena Luthor-Danvers?”

“That would be me,” Lena replied.

“Ah.”  The woman held out the envelope, handing it over to Lena and stepping away, but when Lena went to close the door, she met with the woman’s hand.  “Mrs. Luthor-Danvers, Lena, Happy Anniversary.  I hope it’s everything you could ever want it to be.  I hope you’re truly happy.”

“I…” Instead of just replying, Lena thought about that for a moment and nodded.  “I am.”

“Good,” the woman said.  “You deserve to be.”  Tipping her hat slightly, the delivery woman turned and walked away. 

Lena watched her for a woman then shook her head before closing the door and heading back into the house.

“What was it?” Alex asked.

“Delivery,” Lena said lifting the envelope briefly before tearing into it.  The interior was a card in beautiful swirls of purple and blue and with a gold ‘R.K.’ embossed on the front.  Lena opened it, reading the interior out loud.

 

_Lena Luthor-Danvers,_

_You lived a life out of balance, but when the opportunity for personal gain was made available to you, you chose the good of others over your own.  Karma has paid you back and restored your life to balance.  May you and your wife have all the happiness you deserve with your three children today, and the others you choose to add to your family in the future._

 

Eyebrows high, Lena looked at her wife.  “Alex, who did you tell we were pregnant?”

“No one,” Alex assured her wife.  “I didn’t even tell the kids.  They must have overheard us.”

“Lori, Aiden?” Lena looked at the children.

“Mommy, I didn’t tell anyone,” Lori assured her mother as she pointed at her brother.

“Nu-huh!” Aiden said.  “It wasn’t me.  Why am I always in trouble?”

“Because you can’t keep a secret,” Lori replied.

“Yes, I…” Pointing at Kara, Aiden said nothing else.

“We need to talk about this,” Lucy said to the blonde.

“Lee, which of the security guards brought that up to the house?” Alex asked as she tapped at her watch.  “We need to find out everything we can about the delivery.  If it wasn’t one of the kids, then we have a leak.”

“It…Oh, my God!” Dropping the card on the counter, Lena said, “It wasn’t security.  It was some random delivery person.”

“But, that’s not possible.  How could someone…?”  Pulling out her sidearm, Alex rushed past her wife.  “Lena, stay with the kids.  Kara, Lucy, with me!”  She hit a button on her watch as she rushed out the front door.  “Security, I want the estate on lockdown!  We have an intruder on the grounds.  Secure the perimeter, but no one comes near the main house.  Repeat, secure the perimeter, but no one comes near the main house.”

Inside, Lena wrapped her arms around her children while Maggie helplessly stared on through the screen.  They all stayed there for several minutes.  Eventually, the three women came in front outside.

“Well?” Lena asked.

“There’s no one out there,” Alex said.

“You couldn’t find them?” Lena ran a hand gently over Aiden’s hair.

“Lena, I looked everywhere on the grounds,” Kara explained.  “There’s nowhere someone could have hidden from me.  You know that.  There’s no one out there.”

Lena rolled her eyes.  “I didn’t ring the doorbell and give the card to myself.  I mean…”  She picked up the card, running her thumbed over the embossed letters on the front again.

“Honey, maybe you shouldn’t touch it.  We have no idea what it means,” Alex cautioned.

“We should bring it down to the DEO and analyze it,” Lucy said, holding out her hand.

Reading through the note again, a smile grew on Lena’s face.  “No,” she said once, her smile broadening.  “No, it’s not a threat of any kind.  This is from a…friend.”

Alex placed a hand on her wife’s shoulder.  “Lee, honey, you’re kind of freaking me out.  Do you feel okay?”

“I’m more than okay.  I’m happier than I ever thought I could be,” Lena said kissing Alex firmly.  “Something shifted in my life that day in the mech.  I don’t know if it was luck or fate, but something shifted, and I finally got the life I deserved.  I got you, and then I got them.”  Lena gestured at her children, her hand settling on her abdomen.

The envelope already in her hand, Lucy snatched the card away.  “That’s sweet and adorable, but I’m still going to have my people check this out.”

“Lucy, you don’t have—”

“Hey!” Lucy stared until Lena tightened her lips.  The small woman nodded.  “Being paranoid is in my job description.  You be happy with your family and go invent something or buy something or both.  You do your job, and I’ll do mine.”

Kara laughed, pulling Lucy in close.  “Isn’t she awesome?  I’m a lucky woman.”

Pulling Lena in close, Alex agreed, “We both are.  I don’t know how we did it, but we both hit the jackpot.”

“Maybe it’s karma,” Lori suggested.

“Maybe it is,” Lena said with a knowing smile.  “Maybe it is.”


End file.
